Here is what Minnesota’s contact tracers are asking

As we have noted before, Minnesota’s Department of Health has been oddly reluctant to reveal what questions its Covid-19 contact tracers have been asking people. As I wrote last week:

Presumably the Department of Health’s contact tracers are calling thousands of people each week and asking them these questions. Given this, their desire to hide the questions that were being asked so widely was always strange.

People’s livelihoods hinge on the decisions made based – allegedly – on the data these interviewers are collecting. In the Twin Cities, 94 restaurants have closed in 2020, many after being shut, opened at lower capacity, then shut again by Gov. Walz. Minnesotans deserve greater transparency from the state government than they are getting.

Fortunately, a second contact tracer has come forward and shared the full list of questions they are given to ask, as of December 14th. In the interests of transparency, and with apologies for the small size of he screenshots, the full list can be found below:

Call Log/Interviewer Info:

Tennessen/Call Recording statement:

Demographic Information:

Living Setting- Private Residence:

Living Setting- Hotel/Motel, Long-term Care, Group Home, Homeless/Shelter, Homeless Unsheltered, College/University, Work Dormitory:

Living Setting: Jail, Prison, Other Correctional Setting:

Living setting: Other

Illness History:

Underlying Health Conditions

Exposures: Travel through Gym

Exposures: Community Event/Mass Gathering through Source case:

Release from Isolation

Infectious Period: Determine infectious period, Healthcare visits, congregate living, and travel during infectious period:

Assess Contacts- Occupation: Healthcare, Long Term Care, Residential Treatment Facility

Assess Contacts- Occupation: Shelter, Group Home

Assess Contacts- Occupation: Corrections Setting

Assess Contacts- Occupation: College/University, School K-12, Child Care Center

Assess Contacts- Occupation: Organized Sports

Assess Contacts- Occupation: Other

Assess Contacts- Occupation: Additional workplaces, Workplace Follow-up Call Log

Assess sports, school, childcare, university attendance during infectious period: Sports and Child Care

Assess sports, school, childcare, university attendance during infectious period: K-12

Assess sports, school, childcare, university attendance during infectious period: Youth day camp or Youth Overnight Camp:

Assess sports, school, childcare, university attendance during infectious period: Adult Day Center:

Assess sports, school, childcare, university attendance during infectious period: Other

Assess sports, school, childcare, university attendance during infectious period: College/University

Exclusion Letter:

Assess Contacts- Household and Social Contacts

Contact Specifics: Household, Social, or Workplace Contact

Contact Specifics: Create Contact, Contact Tracing Comments

Exposure Notification Application

Essential Services (only if case is still in isolation)

Prevention (only if case is still in isolation)

Demographics and Isolation Address (DPS statement/isolation address is only if case is still in isolation)

Interview Wrap Up, notes

John Phelan is an economist at the Center of the American Experiment.