US relaxes Covid guidelines
The US’s top public health agency relaxed its Covid-19 guidelines yesterday, dropping the recommendation that Americans quarantine themselves if they come into close contact with an infected person.
The Centres for Disease Control and Prevention also said people no longer need to stay at least 1.8m away from others.
The changes, which come more than two-and-a-half years after the start of the pandemic, are driven by a recognition that an estimated 95 per cent of Americans 16 and older have acquired some level of immunity, either from being vaccinated or infected, agency officials said.
“The current conditions of this pandemic are very different from those of the last two years,” said the CDC’s Greta Massetti, an author of the guidelines.
Many places around the country long ago dropped social distancing and other once-common precautions, but some of the changes could be particularly important for schools, which resume classes this month in many parts of the country.
Perhaps the biggest educationrelated change was the end of the recommendation that schools do routine daily testing, although that practice could be reinstated in certain situations during a surge in infections, officials said.
The CDC also dropped a “test-tostay” recommendation, which said students exposed to Covid-19 could regularly test — instead of quarantining at home — to keep attending school. With no quarantine recommendation anymore, the testing option disappeared too.
Masks continue to be recommended only in areas where community transmission is deemed high, or if a person is considered at high risk of severe illness.
School districts across the US had scaled back their Covid-19 precautions in recent weeks even before the latest guidance was issued. Some have promised a return to prepandemic schooling.
The American Federation of Teachers, one of the largest teachers’ unions, welcomed the guidance.
“Every educator and every parent starts every school year with great hope, and this year even more so,” president Randi Weingarten said.
“After two years of uncertainty and disruption, we need as normal a year as possible so we can focus like a laser on what kids need.”
Previous isolation policies forced millions of students to stay home from school, he said, even though the virus posed a relatively low risk to young people.