NYC's COVID Contact Tracing Will End In April: Reports

NEW YORK CITY — New York City's massive COVID-19 contact tracing program will end in April, according to reports.

The end of Test and Trace, first reported by the New York Times, represents another recent step in a return to a pre-pandemic normal in the city.

Ted Long, the program's executive director, acknowledged as much in an email reported by the Times.

“Trace will be coming to an end in late April — giving us eight final weeks to complete your current work and get New Yorkers ready for the next phase as we learn to live with Covid,” Long wrote to contact tracers, the Times reported.

The COVID-19 tracing program reached more than 1 million contacts over its span, health officials said.

The effort started in June 2020 amid the coronavirus's first wave in the city. Former Mayor Bill de Blasio and health officials hailed it as a way to stop the virus's spread.

But the wide availability of vaccines, home COVID-19 testing and better defenses against the coronavirus increasingly pushed the program out of the spotlight.

COVID-19 cases reached an all-time confirmed peak of 46,000 daily cases in January as the omicron variant spread through the city. But since then coronavirus levels have dropped 99 percent and elected officials have started to roll back vaccine and masking mandates.

Read the full New York Times story here.