Shift away from social distancing, quarantine as US eases virus guidelines

WASHINGTON • The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has loosened Covid-19 guidelines, freeing schools and businesses from the onus of requiring unvaccinated people exposed to the virus to quarantine at home.

The changes unveiled on Thursday are a sharp move away from measures such as social distancing and quarantine requirements, which had polarised much of the country, and effectively acknowledge the way many Americans have been navigating the pandemic for some time.

"We know that Covid-19 is here to stay," Dr Greta Massetti, a CDC epidemiologist, said on Thursday.

"High levels of population immunity due to vaccination and previous infection, and the many tools that we have available to protect people from severe illness and death, have put us in a different place."

The CDC's new guidelines come after many Americans dispensed with practices such as social distancing, quarantine and mask-wearing long ago.

"I think they are attempting to meet up with the reality that everyone... is pretty much done with this pandemic," said Dr Michael Osterholm, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Minnesota.

The CDC said it is making changes now because vaccination and prior infections have granted many Americans some degree of protection against the virus, and treatments, vaccines and boosters are available to reduce the risk of severe illness.

The changes shift much of the responsibility for risk reduction from institutions to individuals. And the recommended prevention strategies no longer draw a distinction between people who are up to date on vaccinations and those who are not, streamlining complicated rules that could be difficult for schools and businesses to navigate.

People who are exposed to the virus no longer must quarantine at home, although they should wear a mask for 10 days and get tested for the virus on day five, according to the new guidelines.

Contact tracing and routine surveillance testing of people without symptoms are no longer recommended in most settings.

Instead of focusing on slowing transmission of the virus, the recommendations prioritise preventing severe illness. They emphasise the importance of vaccination and other prevention measures.

The guidelines around masking - which recommend that people wear them indoors in places where community Covid-19 levels are high - have not changed.

And people who test positive should still isolate at home for at least five days. Those who had moderate or severe illness, or are immunocompromised, should isolate until day 10.

NYTIMES