Atlanta Police Officer Tests Positive For Coronavirus

ATLANTA, GA — An Atlanta police officer has been confirmed to have the new coronavirus, the department said Saturday.

Atlanta Police spokesman Carlos Campos said the officer last worked at Atlanta police headquarters March 11. This is the first known case within the department, the statement said.

"APD has had ongoing cleanings by a professional decontamination company being done at our worksites throughout the city," the department said in a statement. "On Friday, given this development, we made cleaning of the area where the officer worked a priority. The officer has not been to work since March 11. Commanders have spoken to the colleagues of the individual who tested positive, so they are aware of the situation. It is important that the public understand that APD has a contingency plan in place, knowing that at some point it was likely the virus would affect our personnel. That plan expects a certain number of personnel, either by becoming ill or quarantining, to be affected by the virus—just as every other entity across the globe is experiencing— and places a priority on re-directing personnel to answer 911 calls as needed. There is no degradation to our ability to respond to emergencies at this time."

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On March 16, the department released a statement saying they understand the need for police and first responders to remain healthy during a public health crisis.

"We have been monitoring the COVID-19 situation daily for several weeks now and making plans to adjust our operations, if and when that is needed," the department said. "(As of March 16,) there has been no impact on our ability to respond to calls for service and no confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus in our department.

However, we have a detailed contingency plan in place that assumes some of our personnel will either become sick or be required to quarantine. In that event, our primary mission will be to ensure that other personnel are redirected to ensure our ability to receive and respond to 9-1-1 calls is not impacted. Ensuring we have the ability to respond to crises and emergency calls for service will be our priority.

Our Contingency Operations Division is taking the lead on helping us stay informed of developments with regard to COVID-19. Commanders in COD are in close contact with the Mayor’s Office of Emergency Preparedness, The Mayor’s Pandemic Coordination team, as well as public health officials.

Our main focus has been on making sure our personnel remain healthy so that we may continue to serve the public with no disruptions."

The number of confirmed and presumed positive cases of COVID-19 rose from 420 positive cases in the state, with 14 deaths, on Friday, to 555 cases and 20 deaths Saturday night.

Fulton County has the most cases in the state with 99, followed by Bartow with 56, Cobb County with 50, Dougherty with 47, DeKalb with 41, Gwinnett with 23, Cherokee with 17, Carroll and Lee with 14, Clayton with 13, Richmond with 10, and Clarke, Fayette and Hall with nine.

Fulton has had two deaths due to coronavirus as of Sunday morning.

Globally, more than 315,000 people have been infected and more than 13,500 people have died from the new coronavirus, Johns Hopkins reported Sunday morning. Of that total, more than 26,700 confirmed cases are in the United States. There have been 340 deaths in the U.S. have been tied to the virus outbreak, as of Sunday morning.

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