Abstract: Since January 2020 Elsevier has created a COVID-19 resource centre with free information in English and Mandarin on the novel coronavirus COVID19. The COVID-19 resource centre is hosted on Elsevier Connect, the company's public news and information website. Elsevier hereby grants permission to make all its COVID-19-related research that is available on the COVID-19 resource centre - including this research content - immediately available in PubMed Central and other publicly funded repositories, such as the WHO COVID database with rights for unrestricted research re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active. International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents 55 (2020) 105988 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijantimicag Short Communication Can post-exposure prophylaxis for COVID-19 be considered as an outbreak response strategy in long-term care hospitals? Sun Hee Lee a,1, Hyunjin Son b,1, Kyong Ran Peck c,∗ a Division of Infectious Disease, Department of Internal Medicine, Pusan National University School of Medicine and Medical Research Institute, Pusan National University Hospital, 179 Gudeok-ro, Seo-gu, Busan, 49241, Republic of Korea b Busan Center for Infectious Disease Control and Prevention, Pusan National University Hospital and Epidemic Investigation Team of Busan Metropolitan City, 1001 Jungang-daero, Yeonje-gu, Busan, 47545, Republic of Korea c Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Samsung Medical Center, Sungkyunkwan University School of Medicine, 81 Irwon-Ro Gangnam-gu, Seoul, 06351, Republic of Korea a r t i c l e i n f o Editor: Jean-Marc Rolain Keywords: Post-exposure prophylaxis Hydroxychloroquine SARS-CoV-2 COVID-19 Long-term care hospital a b s t r a c t In the context of the ongoing global outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), management of exposure events is a concern. Long-term care hospitals (LTCHs) are particularly vulnerable to cluster outbreaks because facilities for patient isolation and healthcare personnel to care for these patients in isolation are difficult to arrange in a large outbreak situation. Although several drugs have been proposed as treatment options, there are no data on the effectiveness and safety of post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) for COVID-19. After a large COVID-19 exposure event in an LTCH in Korea, PEP using hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) was administered to 211 individuals, including 189 patients and 22 careworkers, whose baseline polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests for COVID-19 were negative. PEP was completed in 184 (97.4%) patients and 21 (95.5%) careworkers without serious adverse events. At the end of 14 days of quarantine, all follow-up PCR tests were negative. Based on our experience, further clinical studies are recommended for COVID-19 PEP. © 2020 Elsevier B.V. and International Society of Chemotherapy. All rights reserved.