No new cases have emerged at either state facility in the two weeks since two Bethel courthouse employees and three Bethel jail employees tested positive for COVID-19.
Twelve courthouse employees were tested for the virus in early August, according to Candice Duncan, the area court administrator for District 4, which oversees Bethel. Ten of the employees tested negative.
“The two employees that had tested positive are doing okay,” she said.
Duncan said that both employees are Bethel residents who came into close contact with a local person who had also tested positive for the virus. She also said that the two employees who tested positive had no close contact with any members of the public 48 hours before receiving their tests.
Courthouse employees are considered essential workers under state regulation. Any employee who leaves the state is required to have two negative COVID-19 tests, or quarantine for 14 days before returning to work. There’s no required timeframe for how far apart the two tests must occur, but the first one can take place up to 72 hours before returning to the state.
Bethel courthouse employees who leave the region but remain in the state are not required to get tested or to quarantine before returning to work, but they are asked to take precautions.
“When they return back to their home court location," Duncan said, "then we’re asking them to minimize their interactions with co-workers when they return, and just be aware and self-monitor for symptoms.”
Courthouse employees are also temperature screened for signs of fever when returning to work from in-state travel. All court employees are required to wear masks and social distance when possible.
Around the time the two courthouse employees tested positive, so did three workers at the Yukon Kuskokwim Correctional Center, Bethel’s state-run jail. No new cases have emerged from that facility either. Alaska Department of Corrections spokesperson Sarah Gallagher said that 17 staff members and 41 inmates were tested. She would not say whether the three employees who tested positive were Bethel residents.
Gallagher said that all Alaska Department of Corrections employees must follow Alaska travel mandates. Those mandates do not require testing for those who travel outside the region, so long as they do not leave the state. If they do leave the state, testing or quarantining is required.
The Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation is urging all employers to require workers who travel outside the region get tested for the virus when returning through the Bethel airport.
Correction: This story has been corrected to say that courthouse employees are temperature screened for signs of fever when returning to work from in-state travel. The original version of this story said that all courthouse employees are temperature screened for signs of fever when arriving at work.
