There have been no further positive COVID-19 cases among Peterborough emergency responders after four members tested positive last week, Fire Chief Ed Walker said Friday.
“Nobody else tested positive so we think we have it under control,” he said. Eight additional members had been taken off the rotation and quarantined due to potential exposure but none came back with positive tests, he said. The crew is slated to return to a full roster on Oct. 28 after all quarantining members are cleared, he said.
Last Thursday, an on-call firefighter had tested positive for COVID-19 as part of a screening for his day job at New Hampshire Ball Bearings. The department was able to identify three other emergency personnel who had worked with the firefighter on a shift last Sunday, and when tested, their results came back positive as well, despite two of them being asymptomatic.
The positive test was the only one reported at the Peterborough NH Ball Bearings facility since the start of the pandemic, Communications Project Manager Hans Baker said. “We have a very rigorous set of protocols that have been in place and have been adjusted over time,” he said, more rigorous than CDC recommendations. He declined to answer whether routine tests were a part of that protocol, but said the company did not feel the need to change their protocol as a result of the positive test.