CORVALLIS, Ore. — Oregon State University students and health care workers are going door-to-door testing residents for the Coronavirus.
Last month they spent three separate weekends going to randomly selected homes in Corvallis offering free COVID-19 tests.
"The participants self collect a nasal swab right there at the door," explained Jeff Bethel, co-director of the project.
The project's goal is to find out how prevalent the virus is in communities.
The latest samples show encouraging results.
"We have found relatively low prevalence," he said.
In the third and last weekend of sampling done, the teams visited 346 households spread across roughly thirty blocks in Corvallis.
78 percent of the residents opted to participate in the study, and 649 people were tested.
The findings suggest about one person in 1,000 in the Corvallis community had the virus.
But Bethel warned, although this might sound promising, it also means there's still a chance to get the virus.
"The probability of going into areas where there are larger and larger numbers of people, that relatively low prevalence estimate still shows that more than likely you'll have at least one other person with Coronavirus in that large gathering," he explained.
The scientist also pointed out the samples were collected when most people were still spending most of their time inside their homes.
He said the probabilities could increase as more counties open up.
Take for example, Deschutes County, where the same sampling was conducted last weekend.
"Bend has been open up for a little while, so those results could help inform the impact of opening up," he said.
Bethel would not say what those results are. They'll be released next week. But he did leave us with this message.
"The bottom line is that it shows that Coronavirus is still in the community," he said. "People should continue to practice social distancing, hand hygiene, and mask wearing."