Staffer at Charlotte-area juvenile justice facility tests positive for COVID-19
All youth at a Charlotte area juvenile justice center will undergo COVID-19 testing after a staff member tested positive for the disease, health officials said Saturday.
The staff member at Stonewall Jackson Youth Development Center in Concord self-reported on Friday testing positive for COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, officials said.
All 87 youth at the center will be tested over the next few days, according to a North Carolina Department of Public Safety news release. Cabarrus Health Alliance, which is Cabarrus County’s health department, advised the testing be done.
The staff member hasn’t worked at the center since Sunday, May 10, when center officials were notified of the worker’s possible exposure to the virus.
The worker showed COVID-19 symptoms on Wednesday, officials said. A COVID-19 test swab was taken and sent to a lab the same day.
All of the juvenile living units have been placed on quarantine, a spokesperson said in an email. Earlier in the day, the center’s director, Peter Brown, said two of the units were put on quarantine, according to a release.
Those units house 16 juveniles, officials said.
No children have shown symptoms of the virus, Brown said.
“Out of an abundance of caution,” he said, staff members are checking children on the two units twice a day for fever and other symptoms.
Per CDC guidelines, seven staff members believed to have had close contact with the employee are being asked to quarantine at home, a North Carolina Department of Public Safety spokesperson said.
All 189 staff members at the center have been offered testing through Cabarrus Health Alliance and an initiative available to all N.C. Adult Correction and Juvenile Justice employees that is free to them.
No children in any of North Carolina’s juvenile justice facilities have contracted COVID-19, according to Saturday’s release.
The facilities have taken numerous measures to prevent spread of the coronavirus, including not allowing visitors and volunteer activities, according to Saturday’s release.
This story was originally published May 16, 2020 at 2:31 PM.