From THEHILL.COM
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention no longer recommends universal masking in health care settings, unless the facilities are in areas of high COVID-19 transmission.
The agency quietly issued the updates as part of an overhaul to its infection control guidance for health workers published late Friday afternoon. It marks a major departure from the agency’s previous recommendation for universal masking.
“Updates were made to reflect the high levels of vaccine-and infection-induced immunity and the availability of effective treatments and prevention tools,” the CDC’s new guidance says.
Now, the CDC says facilities in regions without high transmission can “choose not to require” all doctors, patients, and visitors to mask. Transmission is different from the community levels CDC uses to guide non-health care settings.
Community transmission refers to measures of the presence and spread of SARS-CoV-2, CDC said.
“It is the metric currently recommended to guide select practices in healthcare settings to allow for earlier intervention, before there is strain on the healthcare system and to better protect the individuals seeking care in these settings,” CDC said.
Right now, about 73 percent of the US is experiencing “high”rates of transmission.
Community levels “place an emphasis on measures of the impact of COVID-19 in terms of hospitalizations and healthcare system strain, while accounting for transmission in the community,” the CDC said.
Only 7 percent of counties are considered high risk, while nearly 62 percent of counties are considered low…. (Read more)
Tweets mentioned:
https://twitter.com/meganranney/status/1573684402118447104
https://twitter.com/JeromeAdamsMD/status/1574005861793529857
