MADISON - The state health department is tracking new cases of the coronavirus to determine whether it was spread among voters during Tuesday's spring election.

The state Department of Health Services and local public health officials are "monitoring" the relationship between new cases in the coming weeks and voting in person, agency officials said Thursday.

"We will continue this important work to ensure that every case is followed up on, contacted, and anyone who may have been exposed notified," DHS Secretary Andrea Palm said in a statement. "We hope the extraordinary efforts taken by local clerks, public health, voters, and poll workers helped minimize any transmission but we stand prepared to respond if that isn’t the case."

Live Updates:The latest on coronavirus in Wisconsin

Daily Digest:What you need to know about coronavirus in Wisconsin

The potential for new cases comes as Wisconsin hospitals released data showing dozens have a week or less of crucial protective gear.

Palm said if voters were exposed to the virus, DHS and local public health officials will see new cases beginning next week.

"This information will allow our surveillance epidemiologists the opportunity to identify if the election had any impact on the spread of COVID-19 in Wisconsin," she said. But a full picture of whether in-person voting led to more cases won't be known for several weeks, Palm said.

The state agency has added 120 contact tracers to help local public health officials interview each person infected about anyone else they had been in contact with to notify those who were possibly exposed.

Thousands of voters came to the polls Tuesday after a failed last-minute attempt by Gov. Tony Evers to postpone the election, including 3,000 at each of the five polling places in Milwaukee.

Public health experts warned before and after the election took place that allowing people to vote in person could reverse progress the state has made to contain the spread of the virus.

Columbia University's Sen Pei, a research scientist who helped create a coronavirus prediction model that simulates different levels of daily travel activity, said the election gathering was risky in ways other activities aren't.

"When you go about your daily life, you only go to some regular places. You go to get groceries. You go to work. You only contact people from certain locations," Pei said. "Here, you're gathering people from different locations and they can bring back the virus to their own location. That is like the spark in the process."

Republican lawmakers went to court on Monday to keep the election in place, saying it would be safe because of clerks' efforts to enforce social distancing and protective equipment for poll workers.

"Actually, there’s less exposure here than you would get if you went to the grocery store or you went to Walmart or you did any of the many things we have to do to live in the state of Wisconsin," Assembly Speaker Robin Vos told the Racine Journal Times in an interview Tuesday.

RELATED:Assembly Speaker Robin Vos wore protective gear as a volunteer poll worker, said 'you are incredibly safe to go out'

But researchers said voters could have arrived at polling places with mild to moderate symptoms or still could be in the phase before symptoms start to show.

There's evidence that transmission could be as simple as touching a ballot or a pen that someone else had held and then your face. New research shows it could even spread during conversation between two people standing just a bit too close.

Devi Shastri of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel contributed to this report.

You can find out who your legislators are and how to contact them here.

Contact Molly Beck at molly.beck@jrn.com. Follow her on Twitter at @MollyBeck.