Nurses union condemns CDC’s latest COVID isolation guidelines

National Nurses United, a union of nearly 225,000 U.S. members, issued a statement condemning the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s latest isolation guidelines.

“We are deeply disheartened to once again see the CDC weakening protections for public health, which will mean more transmission, illness, hospitalizations, and cases of Long Covid,” NNU president Jean Ross, RN, said a press release. “We must protect nurses’ health and safety so that they can continue to care for their patients, especially due to the staffing crisis that many hospitals face.”

The CDC announced new guidelines for people with COVID-19 on March 1, recommending those infected treat the virus as if it were the flu.

This eliminated the previous recommendation for those infected to isolate and test for five days. Now, they can return to work and regular activities if it has been at least 24 hours since they had a fever.

On Feb. 23, the NNU issued a letter of warning to CDC director Mandy Cohen,asking the agency not to relax isolation guidance.

The union criticized the CDC for having a “near-exclusive focus” on preventing infections at the cost of excluding other significant health impacts, such as long COVID. The union voiced concern the relaxed isolation guidelines would endanger patients, health care workers and the public.

“NNU’s own research on Long Covid experienced by RNs underlines the significant impact that this condition can have and the ways that it contributes to the health care staffing crisis,” the union stated in its letter.

“NNU’s ninth Covid-19 survey, released in January 2024, found that a majority of RNs report having been diagnosed with Covid-19 at least once with 43.7 percent reporting two or more infections. After recovery from initial infection, a majority of RNs reported ongoing symptoms, including tiredness or fatigue, memory or concentration difficulties, joint or muscle pain, headaches or migraines, difficulty breathing or shortness of breath, heart palpitations, and chest pain.”