photo by: Conner Mitchell/Journal-World

COVID-19 protocols adorn a doorway on the University of Kansas campus.

Students continue to make up more than 97% of positive cases of COVID-19 at the University of Kansas, the total number of which has risen to 474 as of 10 p.m. Thursday.

KU Chancellor Douglas Girod announced the latest testing data Friday afternoon, which also showed that KU’s fraternity and sorority community — which has been in the spotlight for images and videos of large parties without masks or social distancing — is now testing positive for the respiratory virus at a rate of 10%.

The results, Girod said in a campus message, include some targeted follow-up testing for unspecified members of the student population, as well as results from the mandatory initial intake testing program, which will continue through next week.

“Our situation remains dynamic, and we all should expect that to continue moving forward,” Girod said. “The overall number of positive cases and positivity rate remain in line with what we have expected from these results so far, and continue to align with what we are prepared to manage.”

Girod mentioned that KU’s Pandemic Medical Advisory Team is tracking the information from Friday’s results to inform KU’s decisions on the status of campus operations, but didn’t elaborate on whether changes were coming.

Though it wasn’t mentioned in Girod’s message, Friday’s test results showed an exponential increase in the number of cases among students belonging to a fraternity or sorority since the last data release on Tuesday. In that time frame, KU reported testing 265 greek life members, and 137 of them tested positive — a percentage rate of 51.7%.

On Wednesday and Thursday, Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health issued quarantine orders for nine fraternity and sorority houses near campus based on results of entry testing, Girod said. It’s unclear how much of the increase reported in greek life on Friday was from entry testing versus the aforementioned targeted re-testing.

KU greek life typically comprises 4,000 KU students in roughly 45 fraternity and sorority chapters. Of those, around 30 have their own housing where members can live, according to statistics from the university.

“… While the KU and Lawrence communities are experiencing new positive cases as a result of this testing, we also know that identifying positive cases in our population and moving them into isolation and ensuring that close contacts enter quarantine protocols is the best way to stop the spread of the virus,” Girod said.

Faculty and staff members at KU now have nine positive cases of COVID-19, up from six Tuesday, out of a total of 4,299 total tests — a percentage rate of 0.21%. KU’s Edwards Campus in Overland Park reported its first positive case of the virus out of 256 total tests.

Girod said KU’s data from the past seven days has reflected a percent positive rate of 3.82%, which is slightly higher than the overall rate of 2.18%.

KU will next release testing data on Sept. 2.