“Dear PoPville,
A week ago, we received an e-mail from the building administration informing us that there was a confirmed case of COVID-19 in the building; they explained that the person was staying in their apartment. No info about who or which floor the person lived. A couple days ago, I noticed that someone was leaving groceries outside the apartment 2 doors down. A day later, someone did it again, but this time yelling to the person inside that the groceries were there. By then we knew this is where the sick person was.
The last two days, we’ve been awaken by the loud coughing (we could hear it even though there’s an apartment between us). I was about to email the building back asking them to help this person go to the hospital. This morning we saw paramedics outside the apartment and a fully dressed and masked person too. We think the person was evacuated. It is possible that this person was walking around the building for 2 weeks without knowing about their condition.
I just wanted to share this with your audience, this is a real thing and we all have to be careful.”
Another reader writes:
“Dear PoPville,
We live with a few hundred other people in a Dupont Circle apartment building and so far we’re blissfully unaware if any immediate neighbors have been ordered to quarantine.
A quarantined person in a house can limit their exposure to others. But a quarantined person in my building will share the trash room, lobby, laundry room, hallways, stairways and elevators with everyone else because there’s no way not to.
Is the Department of Health supposed to notify people living at the same address as people testing positive for COVID-19?
If so are they notifying them directly or via official paper slapped on the front door like a stop work order? On the bright side a nice quarantine notice might drive the rent down.
Every DC coronavirus update until the latest on March 26 (https://coronavirus.dc.gov/page/coronavirus-data ) mentioned contact tracing, but with layers of apparent qualifications. I can’t quote it now because it’s gone but it sounded like DC DOH limits tracing to contacts who work in nursing homes, hospitals, are first responders, etc.
IMO our management company has been good about communicating best practices and major changes in building operations to protect staff and tenants. But they haven’t said if or how we’ll be notified if our door is within a couple of feet of the door of someone ordered to quarantine because of a positive test (or because they’re symptomatic and presumed positive but not tested.)
We have old disinfectant spray, no masks and a limited number of gloves. We can’t get the supplies to act as if everyone around us is actively communicable. If we knew about a quarantine situation on our floor or to a lesser extent anywhere in the building then we would ramp up precautions just like family living with a quarantined person. For one thing we’d use crappy DIY masks in shared areas because they *are* better than nothing unless someone’s coughing directly down your throat.
Can anyone shed light on quarantine notification requirements (if any) for multi-occupant buildings in DC? Or have we all just been written off?”