Wednesday, January 05, 2022

The CDC's Newly Revised (Jan 4th) Quarantine and Isolation Guidance


 

#16,484

Just over a week ago, the CDC unveiled new Shortened COVID Quarantine & Isolation Times For General Public, designed to get people back to work or school faster, in hopes of creating less absenteeism during the ongoing Omicron wave of COVID.   

It was controversial, in that it eliminated the requirement for a negative test before returning to work, instead recommending for most cases: Isolation for 5 days followed by wearing a well-fitting mask will minimize the risk of spreading the virus to others.

This assumed the person was asymptomatic or `improving' after 5 days, saying that `most people' are at their most contagious just before, and for a few days after, symptoms appeared. As I said last week, it wasn't ideal, but it was understandable if the primary goal is to keep essential services running. 

Yesterday the CDC released new, and frankly, confusing guidance that `suggests' getting a test - assuming that one is a available - after `about 5 days' of isolation, but doesn't require it

I suspect this wording has as much to do with the availability (or expected lack, thereof) of home test kits, as it does anything else. 

Here is the link to the newly revised Quarantine and Isolation guidance, which is divided into 12 subsections (covering a variety of scenarios), including:

Quarantine vs. Isolation

Quarantine

Who does not need to quarantine

Who should quarantine?

What to do for quarantine

Quarantine in high-risk congregate settings

What to do for isolation

Ending isolation for people who had COVID-19 and had symptoms

Ending isolation for people who tested positive for COVID-19 but had no symptoms

Ending isolation for people who were severely ill with COVID-19 or have a weakened immune system (immunocompromised)

Isolation in high-risk congregate settings

Recommendations for Specific Settings

These recommendations do not apply to healthcare professionals. For guidance specific to these settings, see
Additional setting-specific guidance and recommendations are available.

If a camel is truly a horse designed by a committee, then this document undoubtedly has a lot of fingerprints on it. While it would be easy to throw stones, sometimes there are no simple solutions to a complex problem, like a pandemic entering its 3rd year. 

This is obviously a compromise, based a need to keep society running, a lack of testing resources, the futility of stopping community transmission of Omicron, and the impossibility of creating a one-size-fits-all set of guidelines. 

Again, not ideal, but `ideal' left the station a long time ago.  Hopefully most people will use these general guidelines, and a dose of common sense, and stay home until they honestly think they are safe to return to work or school.