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Supervisor Barger joins public health director to launch partnership with Citizen SafePass app

by The AV Times Staff • September 10, 2020

LOS ANGELES – Supervisor Kathryn Barger joined county Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer and other leaders Wednesday to announce a partnership with the Citizen SafePass app.

SafePass is a new tool within the Citizen app that can help individuals manage all COVID related exposure alerts and information. It utilizes technology to provide digital contact tracing, in addition to providing its users with regular symptom tracking and testing information.

“Robust, efficient, and thorough contact tracing is critical to interrupt the ongoing transmission of COVID-19 and reduce community spread,” Barger said. “The SafePass app is an innovative program that will serve as a valuable tool for Los Angeles County in our continued efforts to keep residents safe and move forward on our path to recovery and reopening.”

SafePass uses mobile Bluetooth to anonymously track people with whom an individual has come into contact. If an individual tests positive for COVID-19, it will provide an anonymous alert to those contacts and provide options for nearby testing sites. Users can also opt-in to voluntarily share their health status with friends and family. All of the data that is collected through the contact tracing system is encrypted, stored securely for 30 days and then permanently deleted. These privacy precautions are intended to fully protect its users and their contacts.

“The SafePass app relies on our continued sense of community impact and asks our residents to work with us to slow the spread,” Barger continued. “We are grateful for the opportunity to pursue additional measures that will help in our collective response to this global pandemic so that we can return to a greater sense of normalcy.”

Traditional contact tracing is a lengthy process that relies on information shared by individuals who test positive for COVID. The County currently has 2,600 individuals deployed as contact tracers and to date, they have completed nearly 195,000 contact tracing interviews with cases and 53,000 interviews with contacts. The new technology offered by SafePass will help supplement the County’s contact tracing program.

To find out more information about Citizen’s SafePass app, visit: https://citizen.com/

[Information via news release from the office of Supervisor Kathryn Barger.]

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Filed Under: Health, Home

1 comment for "Supervisor Barger joins public health director to launch partnership with Citizen SafePass app"

  1. In-B4 says

    September 13, 2020 at 7:16 pm

    In before all the numbskulls come by to remind us of our constitutional rights not to share contact, location… etc, info….

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