New CDC COVID-19 Recommendations as of March 1, 2024
5 March 2024
How to Work Through Updated CDC COVID-19 Recommendations at Your Business
As it relates to testing positive for COVID-19, many of our clients follow a “CDC recommendation” policy. Up to this point, the Centers for Disease Control recommended 5 days isolation from start of symptoms or positive test, whichever was earlier, followed by 5 days of masking/distancing as possible.
The CDC has officially updated their recommendation to something similar to the flu or any other respiratory illness:
Stay home when feeling sick. Return to work when feeling better AND fever-free for 24 hours without medication.
If you wish to continue following the CDC recommendations with this adjustment, simply inform your team of the update as quickly as reasonably possible. If you have a team meeting scheduled soon, I recommend using that opportunity to have everyone sign an acknowledgement form (the same form we recommend for safety training). This is not a requirement by any means, just a solid recommendation to best ensure everyone is on the same page.
If you believe the CDC guidelines are now too loose, you can officially implement whatever level of response/restrictions you wish for COVID, flu, or any other illness. If you're already a BPC client, you can just let us know and we can help craft a more formalized policy so you are no longer tied to the CDC recommendation system.
Finally, regardless of whether you follow the new CDC recommendation or enact your own, please remember two things:
- Not everyone's body will respond to COVID in the same way, and some people may need more or less time off to recover than others.
- Like individual companies, some states may still take it upon themselves to enact more strict policy requirements to respond to COVID. CA actually softened its suggested response before the Feds did, so I do not know how likely this course of action is… I will keep an eye on WA, OR, and NY and let those impacted clients know if your state gets squirrelly. 😊
Proceed accordingly and keep your team safe, healthy, and working!
For reference, here's the new CDC guidance: https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2024/p0301-respiratory-virus.html
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