Dear Pitt Community,

As of Thursday, March 11, the Pitt COVID-19 dashboard reflects the following:

The scope of our dashboard and these updates is limited to people who have been on a Pitt campus within the last 14 days.

Since Tuesday, the 5-day moving average of new cases per day on the Pittsburgh campus has more than doubled. At an average of 5 new cases per day, numbers are still relatively low, but we are concerned about this increase.

So far, we know most of the new student cases are among undergraduates living off-campus. Close contact tracing, which is still underway, has found that most of the cases are unrelated.

If we want to remain in Guarded Risk Posture, we must keep the prevalence of COVID-19 low. So far, we’ve been able to do that better than we did in the fall—but this is a wake-up call.

With the weather warming and St. Patrick’s Day approaching, we know people may want to gather in larger groups.  This is the time to be vigilant and keep our circle of close contacts small. We’re calling on everyone to continue to wear well-fitting face coverings (over your nose and mouth), keep 6 feet of distance from others and practice hand hygiene at all times. We are still in a pandemic.

Regional campus numbers remain low. There have been two new student cases at Pitt-Johnstown, but no positives identified through surveillance testing this week.

While interim CDC guidelines say that it is reasonably safe for fully vaccinated people in single family households to visit indoors with other fully vaccinated people, these guidelines do not apply to university, workplace or health care settings. As such, Pitt’s health and safety policies for all campus spaces are not changing at this time, regardless of anyone’s vaccination status. For example, even if you are a health sciences researcher in a lab where all researchers have been fully vaccinated, we do not encourage changing lab meetings to be in-person. Health sciences trainees in clinical settings should continue to maintain proper PPE and mitigation behaviors. We are continuing to monitor these interim guidelines and will update the Pitt community.  

We are ready to begin vaccinating the Pitt community as soon as vaccines arrive, but that timeline remains unknown and outside of our control. Regardless of your vaccination status or preferences, please make sure your colleagues and peers have completed Pitt Vaccine Survey to help us prepare for the day that Pitt gets vaccines.

Thank you as always for your continued patience and efforts to keep the community safe.

Sincerely,

COVID-19 Medical Response Office