Text messages for faculty/staff who test positive
Beginning today, if you are a faculty or staff member and you test positive for COVID-19, the university will send you a text message shortly after your test is processed. The message will look like this:
This is the University of Illinois COVID-19 SHIELD TEAM 30. Your most recent COVID-19 test is positive. You must immediately isolate and are not permitted to work on campus or attend any in-person activities. Champaign-Urbana Public Health District (CUPHD) will contact you within 24 hours to discuss isolation guidelines and contact tracing. You are legally obligated to answer their call. The call will come from a 217-531-XXXX number. You may also email CUPHD at coronavirus@c-uphd.org to indicate windows of time during regular business hours you are available to take their call and to ask any questions. Please remain isolated in your residence. You need to call the confidential IHR COVID-19 hotline at 217-300-9005. IHR will explain the benefits available to cover your isolation period. Please reply Y to confirm you have read this message and are immediately isolating. Researchers at the University of Illinois are studying the way COVID-19 behaves in people over time. They would like to collect saliva and nasal swabs every day for two weeks and track symptoms. If you are interested in participating in this research, please visit this link to share your contact information. This is an automated message.
- Please remember to respond Y to the message to indicate you have taken steps to immediately isolate.
- CUPHD has asked employers to help identify workplace close contacts to assist CUPHD in their contact tracing efforts. As such, when an employee tests positive, Illinois Human Resources (IHR) will then work with the unit to determine if there are other employees who meet the close contact threshold. Once work close contacts have been identified, IHR will inform them to quarantine on a presumptive basis. IHR will also be providing the work-related close contact information to CUPHD, who will then confirm next steps.
For more information, view the Testing Positive for COVID-19 page.