The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shortened isolation periods for health care workers who contract Covid-19 because of concern over hospital staffing shortages.
If there are staffing shortages, the agency said that isolation time can be cut further.
The agency said that workers who received all recommended vaccine doses, including boosters, don't need to stay at home after high-risk exposures.
Many major hospital systems had been forced to move ahead on their own in recent days, creating a patchwork of guidelines regarding workers in anticipation of a winter surge.
The C.D.C. set a 10-day standard for returning to work, but hospitals have settled on seven days as a safe window.
The new recommendations do not apply to the public. The C.D.C. had set a 14-day isolation period for Americans who had been exposed to the H1N1 strain, but then found out that the typical patient wouldn't be infectious for long.
The C.D.C.'s recommendation to only recommend changes in isolation for health care workers is likely to add to the confusion among Americans, since Britain issued a broad recommendation for shortened isolation on Wednesday.
The period for all individuals who have been tested negative for a second time was cut from 10 days to seven days.
Some medical experts pointed to limited evidence regarding when a person with the Omicron variant might no longer be infectious. The C.D.C. revisions have been called out by other researchers.
As we face the prospect of a sudden surge in cases, they are consistently behind in updating recommendations that are needed now.
The dean of the Brown University School of Public Health said it would make sense to shorten isolation times for the public, especially those who are vaccine-free.
A shorter period of time for isolation for health care workers is critical because of the large number of them who will get infections.
I think we have good evidence that people who arevaccinated are more likely to clear the virus quickly. There is no reason to think that wouldn't be true for Omicron.
The administrators of the hospital said that the new changes would not put patients at risk.
The chairman of the department of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco said that the chances of causing a significant amount of infections seem very low if isolation periods are shortened.
The impact on health of keeping them out of the work force is massive. The U.C.S.F. is considering reducing the isolation period to five days for workers.
There are questions regarding how long a person with an Omicron infection can remain infectious. The variant of the coronaviruses is more infectious than previous versions.
There are requirements regarding testing, vaccination status and symptoms in many of the new hospital policies.
Major hospitals in New York State have changed their isolation protocols for vaccine employees.
N.Y.U. Langone shortens its return-to-work policy to five days after a positive test or three days after a sick worker is gone. The isolation period was reduced to seven days. The Mount Sinai Health System moved to seven days from 10 on Thursday.
NewYork-Presbyterian's current protocols allow fully-vaccinated employees to return to work after seven days. The health and safety of our patients, visitors, and staff is of paramount importance to us.
If a worker has not had a high temperature for 24 hours and their symptoms are improving, they can return to work eight days after a positive test.
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There are new treatments. The first two pill treatments for Covid-19 were authorized by the FDA. Some Covid patients who are at higher risk of becoming severely ill will be able to take the new drugs at home.
Many hospitals are already overburdened with patients who are unvaccinated and those who have delayed necessary care during the Pandemic.
Rhode Island is already in a disaster level of care according to Dr. Megan Ranney, an emergency physician and academic dean at Brown University.
There are no staffed beds in the E.R. We are making decisions around treatment that are demoralizing and beyond what I would have thought we would be doing.
The research on how long people remain infectious is very thin. A study in Norway looked at a large group of people who were at a Christmas party and found that the incubation period for the variant was shorter than for Delta.
The Norwegian Institute of Public Health's specialist director for infectious diseases said that the study authors sent out a questionnaire to find out how long the infections lasted.
The C.D.C. says that people who arevaccinated are more likely to be infectious than unvaccinated people.
The president of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology acknowledged that decisions were being made on limited data. She said that federal officials had to consider the risk of not having enough health care workers to care for patients if people were allowed to go back to work too soon.
She said that the staffing shortage is a horrible situation. Hospitals that moved ahead with shortened isolation periods are likely worried that large numbers of staff will get sick and stay out for a long time.
Ms. Pettis said that they can't care for the patients they are trying to see.
She said that the situation is not as dire as it was at the start of the Pandemic, but that the choices now remind her of a time when federal officials were faced with a severe shortage of personal protective equipment.
She said that she doesn't envy the C.D.C. making the call on how to best protect workers and patients.
Others weren't as understanding. Dr. Daniel Diekema, a physician and epidemiologist at the University of Iowa, said that the impact of the Omicron variant's spread will have on an already over stressed health care system.
Health care workers are concerned that shortened isolation periods could endanger them. Jane Thomason is the lead industrial hygienist for National Nurses United, a large union that has been outspoken about the need to protect their members.
She warned that the new protocols must be followed carefully and that they should not be compared to "I don't care if you have an N95, go ahead and take care of patients anyways." That is not fair to the workers and the patients.
