The study encompasses one of the largest datasets yet of positive test results among construction workers and comes at a time when an advisory committee to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention weighs whether essential workers, including those in construction, should be second in line to receive the first available doses of approved vaccines in the United States.
The positivity rates among construction workers in the study were strikingly high when compared to other industries. For example, while construction had a 5.7% positivity rate for individuals who were asymptomatic, the next highest industry, food services, had just a 3.8% rate, or a third lower.
