New Jersey Detention Center Frontliner Tested Positive For COVID-19

A frontliner who works at Elizabeth Detention Center in New Jersey became the first Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) employee to test positive for the deadly COVID-19.

ICE told The Marshall Project that there is at least one other staff employee to contact the virus, but the it decided not to disclose further information aside from the fact that the positive case “did not work in New York or New Jersey.”

The patient was already under self-quarantine when they showed signs of the bug and later tested positive, said the New York Post, citing a statement fro ICE spokesperson Emilio Dabul.

Dabul further noted that ICE has a “pandemic workforce protection plan,” although he didn't mention what measures they are doing to protect detainees. The agency also temporarily suspended social visits to all of its facilities.

To prevent the virus from spreading, the ICE is closely working with public health officials, as well as its own epidemiologists and other specialists to provide guidelines, quarantine and isolation protocols for those who are showing symptoms for COVID-19.

No other staff or detainees in the New Jersey facility are symptomatic of the illness, according to the New York Post.

Doctors and healthcare workers have previously signed an open letter addressed to the ICE to release its detainees to prevent the spread of COVID-19.