How Contact Tracing Works And How It Can Help Reopen The Country

When the call came from the local health department in northeast Nebraska, Katie Berger was waiting. She had already gotten a text from the salon where she'd gotten her hair done recently, telling her that one of the stylists had COVID-19. She knew she was at risk.

"They said, 'We're calling to inform you that you were exposed to a COVID-19 patient,' " Berger says. "It was still pretty scary getting that call, even though I knew it was coming." The public health official told her to monitor her temperature and watch for possible symptoms until two weeks after the haircut — April 17. Berger's been staying at home since that call, hoping her quarantine will end uneventfully.

This process is called contact tracing. It's been a critical tool to control the spread of infectious diseases for decades. Now, public health leaders are calling for communities around the country to ramp up capacity and get ready for a massive contact tracing effort to control the coronavirus.

Here's a