Contact tracers and accelerated testing for COVID-19, the coronavirus disease, are the two ways to successfully open up states and counties in the country without causing a resurgence of cases. Contact tracers track down those who came in contact with an infected individual in order to urge them to isolate or quarantine.

Critics of contact tracing call it overkill and a violation of an individual’s rights, but survival makes it a logical approach. Dr. Alex Billioux, assistant secretary for the state’s Office of Public Health, said the individuals that tracers are seeking are those who came into close contact with an infected person — meaning within 6 feet for longer than 15 minutes.

Billioux said patient privacy will be protected, and contact tracers are undergoing rigorous training. The first 250 were scheduled to begin working today at call centers in Lafayette and New Orleans. The number of tracers needed may climb to 700.

Gov. John Bel Edwards and Billioux said the state must have the ability to quickly identify new infections through widely deployed testing.

Billioux said, “This will allow us to identify people who really shouldn’t be out there going to shops and to facilities and reducing the risk of spread even as we move in general to being able to go to a little bit more of the kinds of activities we were doing before stay-at-home.”

Restaurants are beginning dine-in services and salons and barbershops will be among the businesses able to open, but they will have to observe reduced 25 percent occupancy. Infection levels are expected to rise and Edwards said even if the state had more tests and tracers than it does now, “that’s not going to be enough to keep a lid on cases.”

The Advocate said when Louisiana learned of its first coronavirus case in early March, the state health department deployed a team of contact tracers to track down people who came into contact with those who tested positive. The newspaper added the team was quickly overwhelmed as officials discovered there was rapid community spread of the virus in New Orleans.

Edwards said Louisiana received its first batch of testing equipment from the federal government that is part of a promised ramp-up to 200,000 tests per month. Billioux said the state lab is also developing a way to test people for the coronavirus through their saliva.

The end of this pandemic is nowhere in sight. Survival will depend on people wearing masks, continuing to practice social distancing, washing their hands and taking other precautions.

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This editorial was written by a member of the American Press Editorial Board. Its content reflects the collaborative opinion of the Board, whose members include Crystal Stevenson, John Guidroz, Mike Jones and Jim Beam.