SALT LAKE CITY — A male Brigham Young University-Idaho student in his twenties is recovering in his Rexburg, Idaho, apartment after testing positive for COVID-19, according to the university and the Eastern Idaho Public Health Department.
The student first showed symptoms on March 8 while visiting Utah, said Mimi Taylor, the department’s public information officer. She said Idaho reported the positive test to the Utah Department of Health.
The student drove back to BYU-Idaho in Rexburg on March 11, said Geri Rackow, director of Eastern Idaho Public Health. The man then stayed in his college apartment until he sought medical care on March 12. He remained self-isolated in his apartment while test results were pending.
He has mild symptoms and did not and will not require hospitalization, according to a BYU-Idaho news release. He remains isolated in his apartment and is being monitored by the health department.
“Our staff is working very quickly to identify those who have had possible exposure,” Rackow said during the afternoon press conference in the Madison County Courthouse in Rexburg. “Our staff will be contacting those that have potential risk.”
The confirmed case is the first in Madison County and the second in the Eastern Idaho Health District.
The student is the eighth confirmed case in Idaho, according to Niki Forbing-Orr, public information manager for the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare.
BYU-Idaho officials said they learned about the positive test on Tuesday.
“We have been taking all the recommended measures that our Church Educational System leaders and government and health officials have been providing us,” BYU-Idaho spokesman Brett Sampson said at the press conference.
BYU-Idaho canceled all of its classes on Friday, Monday and Tuesday due to the pandemic. Classes are scheduled to resume Wednesday via remote instruction.
The university last week encouraged students to leave Rexburg and return to their family homes while they complete the semester online. Sampson said the university does not have a count of the number of students who have left Rexburg.
Rackow said the long delay between the test last week and the test result announced today was due to the volume of tests being evaluated at the commercial lab that handled the student’s test.
Idaho Gov. Brad Little declared a state of emergency last week. The declaration opened access to national and state stockpiles of supplies, Dave Jeppesen, director of the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, said during a town hall teleconference earlier Tuesday.
The town hall began during BYU-Idaho’s first virtual campus devotional.
The devotional began at 11:30 a.m. The speaker, math professor Shane Goodwin spoke from the pulpit in the BYU-Idaho Center with no live audience. The devotional was streamed live over byui.edu and broadcast on BYU-Idaho Radio.
The Idaho Department of Health and Welfare announced two new cases just before 10 a.m. on Tuesday, bringing the total number of cases in the state to seven, according to a news release.
The department had signaled that it would alter its reporting of new cases going forward.
“The Department of Health and Welfare will continue to issue press releases for significant events related to the pandemic. Because of the number of new cases, however, the department will no longer announce individual cases of COVID-19 in press releases.”