COVID-19
Return to Campus Resources
Washington DC Campus Updates
We are continuing to require a full course of COVID baseline vaccinations and at least one booster shot of all JHU employees and students. Documentation must be provided through our Vaccine Management System.
- Undergraduate residential students should self-test no more than 72 hours before arriving on campus/in Baltimore. While we are not asking for verification, students who test positive should notify Student Health using this form and remain off campus and isolate for a minimum of five days. They will be advised to test again after five days and should not return until they have a negative test and are asymptomatic or have resolving symptoms and are cleared by Student Health staff.
- Routine asymptomatic testing will not be required for any population, including those with exceptions to the university’s vaccine mandate. We may reinstate testing requirements for particular groups if necessary to address outbreaks during the semester. Voluntary PCR-based saliva testing will continue through the fall semester and free rapid test kits will continue to be available to all affiliates.
- Masking is no longer required in any campus spaces, including for individuals with exceptions to the vaccine mandate. Masking is highly effective at preventing the spread of COVID, and we may reinstate the mandate for certain groups or in certain circumstances.
- Individuals may choose to continue masking themselves based on their individual circumstances, and we will continue to provide free, high-quality masks for all affiliates.
- We are continuing to require a full course of COVID baseline vaccinations and at least one booster shot of all JHU employees and students. Documentation must be provided through our Vaccine Management System. Our policy for granting medical and religious exceptions remains unchanged and can be found on the coronavirus information website.
- We have added Novavax as an option for baseline vaccination but are still requiring an mRNA (Pfizer or Moderna) booster shot as soon as individuals are eligible, regardless of their initial vaccine.
- Individuals arriving from overseas who received a vaccine authorized by the World Health Organization but not the U.S. Food and Drug Administration are immediately eligible for a booster (you may wait 28 days following your last dose).
- If you have any COVID or flu-like symptoms, including fever, muscle or body aches, coughing, congestion or a runny nose, difficulty breathing, diarrhea, or fatigue, do not come to campus for class or work. Johns Hopkins faculty and staff who feel ill or are concerned about exposure to the coronavirus should continue to utilize the Johns Hopkins COVID-19 Call Center at 443-287-8500, seven days a week, between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. Students should call 410-516-5709 seven days a week between 8:30 a.m. and 6:30 p.m., or email [email protected].
- Anyone testing positive should isolate for at least five days and until they are free of symptoms. Employees are still eligible for 10 days of COVID leave in addition to other forms of leave, which can be used for one or more infections over the course of the pandemic (up to 10 days total across all infections, not per infection).
- We are continuing our current policy of employing isolation in place for residential undergraduates who test positive in most circumstances. Limited alternative accommodations will be made in cases where isolation in place can’t be done safely, as determined by our medical professionals.
- No restrictions are in place with regard to events and gatherings or serving food and beverages.
Professor and Executive Vice Provost for Academic Affairs
Vice Provost for Student Health and Well-Being
Jon Links
Professor, Vice Provost, and Chief Risk Officer
Dear Johns Hopkins Community:
- Food service will be allowed at indoor events. Physical distancing should still be maintained where feasible. Remaining restrictions on off-campus business meals, which are currently limited to four people together, also are lifted.
- Campus guests older than 5 years old who will be inside campus-operated buildings in the U.S. are expected to comply with university COVID vaccination requirements already in place for our affiliates. Details of those requirements and how they apply to campus guests are available on the vaccination page of the coronavirus information website.
Vice Provost for Student Health and Well-Being
Dear Johns Hopkins community:
- Health checks for JHU affiliates coming to JHU campuses using Prodensity will no longer be required. We encourage keeping the app on your mobile device as we will continue to use it to communicate important information about testing sites and our COVID protocols. As we detailed in our 11/19 communication, no one should come to campus when they are sick.
- Given the continued low occurrence of COVID cases on campus, we are returning to a requirement of once-weekly, mandatory asymptomatic testing for undergraduate and graduate students. Mandatory weekly testing is expected to remain for the rest of the spring term, and testing continues to be available to faculty, staff, trainees, and postdocs who want it. Details are on the JHU coronavirus information website. As is currently the case, testing requirements will vary in some divisions based on the nature of certain programs. In those cases, students will receive additional instruction from their divisions. Individuals who have approved exceptions to the university vaccination or booster policy must continue to test twice a week.
- Food service will be allowed at indoor events, and on-campus dining will return without capacity restrictions. Physical distancing should still be maintained where feasible. Remaining restrictions on off-campus business meals, which are currently limited to four people together, also will be lifted.
- Campus guests older than 5 years old who will be inside campus-operated buildings in the U.S. are expected to comply with university COVID vaccination requirements already in place for our affiliates. Details of those requirements and how they apply to campus guests are available on the vaccination page of the coronavirus information website.
Meredith Stewart
Interim Vice President for Human Resources
- A clinic for JHU community affiliates is scheduled for Monday, Feb. 14, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Freshman Annex.
- JHU is sponsoring a clinic that is open to members of the public ages 12 and up, as well as JHU affiliates, on Monday, Feb. 28, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Bunting Meyerhoff Interfaith and Community Service Center, 3509 N. Charles St.
Vice Provost for Student Health & Well-Being and Interim Vice Provost for Student Affairs
Dear Johns Hopkins Community:
- Masks. We will require the use of N95s, KN95s, or a combination of a cloth mask with a surgical mask. A cloth mask alone or a surgical mask alone will no longer meet the university’s mask requirement. School of Medicine affiliates will continue to follow Johns Hopkins Medicine’s masking policy. We will distribute a variety of mask types at numerous locations around the university, on all campuses, beginning next week. Whatever kind of university-approved mask you use, the most important thing is to wear it consistently and properly—with a tight fit and covering both the mouth and the nose.
- Booster mandate. We are glad to see so many of you getting ahead of our Feb. 1 deadline for booster shots. Boosters offer significant protection against omicron, and we urge you to get yours as soon as you are eligible. Information about on-campus booster clinics and how to sign up for a shot is available on the JHU Coronavirus Information website. Once you get your booster, you must register it in the Vaccine Management System, even if it is registered in MyChart.
- Testing. In order to catch COVID cases more quickly and reduce the likelihood of outbreaks on campus, we have increased to twice a week our current mandatory testing requirements for undergraduate and graduate students who will be on campus, and we encourage faculty and staff to take advantage of our on-demand asymptomatic testing, which is available at a wide variety of locations across our campuses. Directions on scheduling an appointment through MyChart are available online.
- Return tests for undergraduates living in residence halls. In addition to the increased testing above, undergraduates living on campus will be required to test immediately upon their arrival and to quarantine in their rooms until they receive a negative result. Students arriving the weekend of Jan. 21-23 will be given a rapid antigen self-test so that we can be assured that they will get their results in advance of the first day of classes on Jan. 24. Details will be sent to undergraduate students in a follow-up message.
- Academic flexibility. While we remain committed to a full return to campus and onsite instruction, we anticipate that both faculty and students may face challenges in maintaining academic continuity during the next two weeks as we return to campus and resume testing. It is important that we all treat one another with empathy and understanding, and in some circumstances exercise flexibility in how we maintain teaching and learning. Our divisions will provide temporary adjustments as needed to faculty whose ability to teach in person is impacted by the pandemic, owing to circumstances such as unexpected school closures and other child care disruptions, the need to care for family members, etc. Faculty will continue to take steps to support students in keeping up with their coursework if they are required to isolate or quarantine.
- Hybrid and remote work for staff. Thanks to your adherence to public health measures, our campuses remain safe, but we recognize that this is a challenging time for many members of our workforce in terms of managing the personal and family disruptions of the pandemic. For that reason, we will extend the period of increased workplace flexibility (announced on Dec. 31) until Feb. 7, at the discretion of each division. To the extent that staff can perform some or all of their work remotely, subject to departmental or divisional approvals, they may do so, and we extend our continued gratitude to all those employees who are and have been working in person during this time.
- Isolation housing. We have substantially increased our inventory of isolation housing compared to last semester, and we have adjusted our protocols to ensure we are prioritizing its use to house those undergraduates whose living situations put them at most risk of spreading the virus to others. Undergraduates living in residence halls are our first priority because congregate living often makes isolation in place difficult. Undergraduates living off campus are no longer required to isolate in university-provided housing; such housing cannot be guaranteed for off-campus students but may be made available if inventories allow and considering the student’s individual circumstances. Depending on conditions, students may be required to isolate in their rooms.
- Quarantine. Consistent with CDC guidelines and the advice of our own experts in public health and infectious disease, fully vaccinated (including a booster) individuals are no longer required to quarantine after a meaningful contact. Those students who are required to quarantine (e.g., those who have received a vaccine exception or are not yet boosted) will do so in their own rooms or residences, even in shared living situations.
- Contact tracing. Because omicron appears to develop and spread more quickly than previous variants, our existing manual system of contact tracing is less effective. Instead, we have adopted an automated system in which those who test positive will fill out a form listing their close contacts, and those close contacts will then be notified by email.
- Dining facilities and events. We will move to grab-and-go service at our residential dining facilities, and special permission will be required for all nonacademic indoor events of 50 people or more through Feb. 6. Grab-and-go food at events is suspended during this period.
COVID is a serious and exhausting challenge, but it is important to emphasize how much better prepared we are to face the virus now than we were when it first emerged almost two years ago. The steps you have taken—vaccination, mask-wearing, testing and more—have contributed immeasurably to the safety of our community and to our ability to meet our mission of education, research, and service. At this time of higher community prevalence, we ask you to be particularly careful to monitor yourself for symptoms and to stay home and get tested if you are sick. We thank you for your continued diligence in the weeks ahead.
Interim Vice Provost for Student Affairs
- Document your booster: Upload proof of your booster shot to the Vaccine Management System (VMS) now, or as soon as you’ve had your shot.
- Eligibility: You are eligible for a booster if you got your second shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine six months ago or more, or the single shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine more than two months ago. If you have received two doses of J&J, you should get a Pfizer or Moderna booster six months after your second J&J shot.
- New international students: If you have gotten a vaccine authorized by the World Health Organization but not one authorized by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, you are immediately eligible for a booster (you may wait 28 days following your last dose). Only one booster dose (either Pfizer or Moderna) is required for those individuals. This is a change from previous university policy (which required those with international vaccines to be revaccinated), based on emerging science related to the efficacy of boosters.
- Rolling deadline: Those who are not yet eligible for a booster as of Feb. 1 will be required to receive a booster as soon as they become eligible (six months after a second shot of Pfizer or Moderna, six months after a J&J booster, or two months after receiving the Johnson & Johnson vaccine). Those individuals will have two weeks after they become eligible to get the booster and upload their documentation to the Vaccine Management System.
- Exceptions: If you have an approved medical or religious exemption to the COVID vaccine, it carries over to the booster requirement. You do not need to apply again.
- Don’t delay: If you can get a booster shot prior to the return to campus in January, we urge you to do so. Booster appointments can be made now through MyChart or at state and local vaccination sites and pharmacies. Additional on-campus clinics for boosters are in the process of being scheduled. See the Coronavirus Information website for the most up-to-date information.
Kevin Shollenberger
Vice Provost for Student Health & Well-Being
Interim Vice Provost for Student Affairs
Dear Johns Hopkins Community:
- If you have an exception to the vaccine mandate and normally test two times per week, you will still be required to test. If you plan to be on campus only one day during a given week over the break, you will only be required to test only once.
- If you normally test one time per week, you will still be required to test one time.
Professor, Vice Provost, and Chief Risk Officer
Dear Johns Hopkins Community:
Professor, Vice Provost, and Chief Risk Officer
Professor and Executive Vice Provost for Academic Affairs
Information and Resources
JHU Coronavirus Resources
JHU Coronavirus InformationJHU Return to Campus Guide
JHU Social Compact
Your Health & Safety
JHU Coronavirus FAQ