Finner on positive COVID-19 test: 'I hope to be back to work soon'

Houston Police Department (HPD) Chief Troy Finner said that he tested positive for COVID-19 on Wednesday, according to the law enforcement agency's official Facebook page.

In a statement posted to the account, Finner explained that he learned on Tuesday that he was at risk and a test 24 hours later confirmed he had the illness. 

"My symptoms are mild and I will spend the next several days isolating myself at home and getting some rest," the city's top police officer said in the statement.

Finner further urged anyone who was in close proximity of him at an event on Saturday to get tested themselves.

He has cancelled public engagements as he recovers, the statement read.

"I hope to be back to work soon," the chief, who was hired to the post last year, said.

Houston CBS affiliate KHOU reported that Texas has seen a spike in COVID-19 infections during the summer months since the pandemic began two years ago.

"Summer of 2020, that's when we had our first big wave," Dr. Peter Hotez, the dean for the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, told the station. "And then we got hit again in 2021 and that was pretty devastating."

Hotez, one of the leaders in the Houston medical community's fight against COVID-19, himself tested positive last month.

KHOU reported that recent wastewater samples indicated that Houston's 14-day average COVID-19 positivity rate earlier this year was at around 20%.

According to Finner's biography on HPD's website, the chief is a native Houstonian who was born in the Fifth Ward and raised in the Hiram Clarke neighborhood.

A graduate of Madison High School, he earned a bachelor's degree from Sam Houston State University (SHSU) and a master's degree from the University of Houston-Clear Lake (UHCL).

He has more than 30 years of law enforcement experience, per the website.

Finner succeeded Art Acevedo after the latter accepted the top job at the Miami Police Department (MPD) in Florida.