By Anthony Covino
Sports Editor
The next steps to prevent the rise of COVID-19 cases in New Jersey, New York and Connecticut were put in place Wednesday, June 24, by the tri-state governors — Phil Murphy, Andrew Cuomo and Ned Lamont, respectively — with a new travel advisory for visitors who live in states with spiking coronavirus cases.
The tri-state advisory says that travelers from states with significant community spread must quarantine for 14 days when visiting our area. The advisory also applies to tri-state residents who visit those areas. Eight states meeting that criteria are: Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Utah.
The Equinox reached out to Angelo Carfaga, FDU’s head of media relations, for clarification about how the advisory would work for new and returning students who live out of state.
“Like everyone else, we learned about this new regulation yesterday,” Carfaga said in an email to The Equinox. “The University is following all updates from state leaders and will incorporate protocols as necessary as we prepare for the upcoming semester. While many things may change from now until the start of the fall semester, FDU and its students will need to follow all such governmental directives.”
Carfaga said that there were 7,834 undergraduate students last year at FDU, with the “vast majority” from states within close proximity to New Jersey, including New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware and other New England states.
None of those states fit the category for the quarantine — a positive test rate higher than 10 per 100,000 residents or a state with a 10% or higher positivity rate over a 7-day rolling average, according to NJ.gov.
Some 795 FDU students, or 9%, were from other states, Carfaga said.
For more exact data, Carfaga said, “I will need time to work with our Office of Institutional Research, but again we don’t have full data for Fall 2020 yet.”
Gov. Cuomo photo
Press conference to announce new quarantine plan.
