If you are vaccinated and boosted and have had close contact with a positive case of COVID, you may continue to attend in-person classes provided you wear a mask in all areas, including your living space, when not eating or sleeping. At this point in time, vaccinated persons who have had close contact with someone who is positive for COVID do not need to quarantine so long as they don’t have symptoms of COVID. Contact Student Health Services to schedule a COVID test to take place 5-7 days after exposure.

You will be contacted by Loyola’s Contact Tracing team via Loyola email or phone call if you are identified as a close contact. Please consider saving their phone number in your phone so you know that you should answer the call. The Loyola Contact Tracing phone number is 410-618-9550.

Information shared with the contact tracer will remain confidential, and a student will not be referred to the conduct process for information shared with the contact tracer. However, information shared outside of the contact tracing process may be reported to the Office of Student Conduct. We all have a responsibility to keep our community safe and particularly our individual commitment to the common good.

Close contact is defined as someone who was within 6 feet for a total of 15 minutes or more within two days prior to illness onset, regardless of whether the contact was wearing a mask.

Any student who tests positive for COVID-19 should report their result on the Student COVID Case Reporting form. Once that form is complete, you will receive further information through email for next steps. If you receive your positive result after hours or on the weekend, we ask that you complete the form, quarantine in your room with a mask and understand that Student Health Services will be in touch during normal business hours (M-F). Students are only permitted to leave their room with an N95 or KN95 mask for food and medical attention at urgent care. If you need assistance due to your illness, please go to one of the local urgent care centers or contact our on-call service at 410-583-9396.

Isolation-in-place is for individual students who have tested positive for COVID-19 and need to isolate in their bedroom in their residential unit according to university guidance.

While in isolation, you should remain in your bedroom as much as possible if the others in your living space have not also tested positive. You should not use the common areas in the residence halls. Within your unit, please limit your time in the shared spaces such as the kitchen or living room in your suite or apartment or in the residence halls. If you must use the kitchen, wear a well-fitting mask and wipe down all surfaces with disinfectant wipes following use. If sharing a bathroom, you should wipe down the faucets and other surfaces after use, open any windows, and run the fan continually until out of isolation.

You will be responsible for obtaining your own meals during your isolation period. There are many options on how to do this including asking a friend or roommate for help, or if needed wearing an N95 or KN95 mask to get food from the closest dining facility and immediately return to your room. In general, try to limit your visits outside of your room as much as possible.

Order through a food or grocery delivery service (e.g., GrubHub, DoorDash, Instacart, etc.). You will be able to leave your room briefly to pick up your food in the lobby of your building.

Important: You must wear an N95 or KN95 mask the entire time you are out, including while you are in your building’s common spaces to get food (hallways, elevators, stairwells, etc.). You must immediately return to your room after picking up your meal and you are not permitted to take any form of public or shared transportation (ex: shuttle, bus, taxi/ride share). Any student found to be knowingly in violation of these policies will be subjected to the Loyola University Maryland Student Conduct process.

We understand you may have questions about living with someone who tested positive for COVID-19. It’s important to remember that residential students who become sick with many different illnesses, such as the flu, a cold, mono, a stomach virus, usually remain in shared rooms/suites with their roommates while recovering.

Today, as we move more toward an endemic approach to COVID-19 thanks to highly effective vaccines, mutations in the virus that are associated with milder illness, higher population-level immunity, and more widely available medication (when clinically indicated), students are rarely getting severely ill from COVID-19. These reasons—coupled with Loyola’s very high rates of boosters—have us well-positioned to use an isolate-in-place protocol. Under this protocol, residential students who test positive for COVID-19 will isolate in their own room/suite—even though their roommates may be negative for COVID-19—without the need to relocate to a temporary housing assignment. Do not invite any visitors to your room/suite until your roommate’s isolation period is over.

Guidance for people exposed to COVID-19 depends on your vaccination status, whether you have symptoms or not, and whether you have had a previous COVID-19 infection within the last 90 days.

• Please follow the instructions for what to do if you were exposed for guidance on quarantine and testing.
• If you were exposed, you are expected to test in the appropriate time frame and mask for the 10 full days following your exposure. If at any time, you were to become symptomatic, take a test or call Student Health Services.

If you are in quarantine or isolation, you should communicate with your professors about how to best keep up with your coursework. You can expect professors to keep their Moodle sites, including assignments and required course materials, up to date; to respond to email queries; and to arrange to hold office hours virtually, as appropriate, and feasible. If a significant number of students in a class are in quarantine and isolation, faculty may move the class online, with the approval of their academic dean.

If you are vaccinated and have had close contact with a positive case of COVID, contact your site supervisor and University supervisor immediately to report the exposure. Follow externship/practicum site guidance on continuing in-person activities. You should also alert Student Health Services to your exposure by completing the daily symptom tracker and follow their guidance for COVID testing. 

If you have an approved vaccine exemption and have been exposed to COVID, you should quarantine at home, notify your professors, and reach out to SHS through covidtesting@loyola.edu. SHS will follow up with guidance regarding quarantine and testing requirements. You should contact your site supervisor and University supervisor immediately to report the exposure.

Regardless of your vaccination status, do not report to the site if you have any symptoms of COVID-19 or you have had a positive COVID test and have not been cleared by Student Health Services (SHS) or your primary care physician to return to in-person activities.