HARTFORD, Conn. — Gov. Ned Lamont confirmed Thursday he has tested positive for COVID-19.
He made the announcement on his social media pages, saying "I wanted you to hear straight from me that I tested positive for COVID-19 today."
Contact tracing was done to inform the people he has been around, Lamont said.
The governor took a regularly scheduled COVID-19 rapid self-test, which came back positive, according to Lamont's office. A second rapid test came back positive, and Lamont is now waiting for results from a PCR test.
He also noted that he is fully vaccinated and "double boosted," and encouraged people to get the COVID-19 vaccine and boosters if eligible.
Lamont received his second COVID-19 booster last Thursday. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) now recommends certain immunocompromised individuals and people over the age of 50 who have received their first COVID-19 booster at least four months ago get a second booster shot.
"I feel good and I’m not experiencing any symptoms," Lamont said on Twitter.
Lamont will isolate for the next five days and will continue to work from home.
"I look forward to getting back into the office as soon as I can," Lamont added.
Lieutenant Governor Susan Bysiewicz spoke about the governor's condition at a news conference.
"He is asymptomatic but he is working from home and I do want to note that he is fully boosted," said Lt. Bysiewicz.
This comes at a time when the subvariant has been causing a slight uptick of positive COVID-19 cases across the state which experts say could develop into a new wave of cases based on what has been seen in Europe and Asia.
Doctors seem optimistic and said with warmer temperatures on the way, it will mean less transmission.
"Temperatures are going up and the humidity is going up, we'll see less transmission. We are by no means out of the pandemic and we remain ready to take care of future surges," said Dr. Thomas Balcezak, the chief clinical officer of Yale New Haven Health.
As more subvariants develop, the virus will always target the most vulnerable and immunocompromised populations.
However, what differs this time, according to Dr. Manisha Juthani of the Department of Public Health (DPH) is the number of resources.
"We also have oral antivirals that are more readily available. These are two things that we have in our toolbox that we didn't have before," said Dr. Juthani.
DPH is now changing how often they release COVID-19 data. Instead of every day, it will be over a seven-day period.
Yale New Haven Health's CEO Christopher O'Connor agreed with this change.
"That data was critical because we had resource allocations and challenges that we needed to contend with, and it was a planning tool - that is not the case right now," said O'Connor.
The focus would be on the trend over the week instead of what has happened in the last day which can vary significantly up or down and misrepresent what is going on with the metric.
"I think the infrastructure that we've built - it's a deal if the need arises," added O'Connor.
It is not just Connecticut that is changing the way it is reporting COVID-19 data.
According to the New York Times, approximately nine states have shifted to reporting data either once or twice a week.
Leah Myers is a digital content producer at FOX61 News. She can be reached at lmyers@fox61.com
Carmen Chau is an anchor and reporter at FOX61 News. She can be reached at cchau@fox61.com. Follow her on Facebook and Twitter.
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