On March 1, almost four years after the state of emergency for COVID-19 was declared, and mere weeks after the second largest surge of the pandemic, the CDC dropped all remaining COVID-19 prevention guidelines for the general public. The move has been criticized by disability rights activists as well as researchers and medical professionals for leaving immunocompromised and disabled people behind and ignoring the risks of long Covid. Rather than having any type of collective or systematic response, the CDC has decided to place the burden of COVID-19 prevention almost entirely on individuals.
Under the new guidelines, COVID-19 recommendations are now combined with those for other respiratory illnesses such as the flu. While reporting on the changes has mainly focused on the fact that the recommended isolation period is now only 24 hours if one is fever-free and symptoms are improving, the updated guidelines now also list key COVID-19 prevention strategies such as masking and testing as additional rather than core strategies.
Treating COVID-19 like the flu both ignores the ways in which COVID-19 is more contagious, more severe and has more longer term consequences and the fact that flu deaths could also be reduced by more robust public health strategies. As Maria Town, president of the American Association of People with Disabilities argues, “What does the strategy of ‘treating COVID like the flu’ say about how many deaths the CDC will tolerate? What does it say about whose lives the CDC deems worthy, and whose lives are they already counting on losing? In streamlining the guidance, the goal should be to take all viruses more seriously, not take COVID less seriously.”
To be clear, the CDC is not arguing that people are no longer infectious after 24 hours. People can still be contagious without a fever, when their symptoms are improving or when completely asymptomatic. Rather, the CDC is arguing that it is simpler for people to understand a policy where they are allowed (or forced to) return to work or school while infectious. While death rates per week are lower than in the early days of the pandemic, more than 1,000 people are still dying from COVID-19 every week. That means twice the student population of Wellesley is dying every single month. Thousands more will develop long Covid and become temporarily or temporarily disabled. Already, almost 18 million Americans have long Covid, a number that has increased rapidly in recent months.
This change has impacted more than guidelines. The government has also removed some of the scant resources it still had in place. Within a week of the new guidance, the free rapid test program was once again suspended. Key CDC webpages, such as “Find Free High Quality Masks” are now archived and no longer being updated.
How much choice do people have to protect themselves against illness when masks are expensive, tests aren’t covered by insurance anymore and they don’t have paid sick leave? Can people choose to stay home if they still feel sick after 24 hours if their boss is threatening to fire them? Will students be willing to miss class if a professor only offers an excused absence for the first day they miss?
Right now, the solution the CDC is proposing is to let the majority of people return to normal life, while those most vulnerable to a COVID-19 infection are almost completely excluded from society. I want you to think back to March 2020 when many of us were either forced to remain completely at home, or if we were considered essential workers, to put ourselves at risk of exposure to a scary new virus every time we went to work. Now imagine that you still need to isolate yourself now, four years later, but remote and hybrid options are gone, and you have to watch your friends go on with their lives without you.
To be clear, this article isn’t my attempt to guilt-trip or scare you into masking more or isolating longer (although if you have the financial ability to do so, it certainly doesn’t hurt). Such an individualistic lens on public health ignores the ways in which systemic solutions are needed.
The US government could have used the pandemic as a catalyst to expand paid sick leave, strengthen worker protections, improve the US healthcare system and offer tangible support such as free masks and tests and financial support to people out of work or isolated at home. Instead the US has continued to spend its money on policing, the military and funding genocides abroad.
Not only would these systemic solutions have helped reduce COVID-19 deaths, they also would have helped reduce deaths from other contagious diseases, including ones that are more normalized such as the flu.
I know it’s 2024 and everyone is tired of hearing about COVID-19. I’m not tired of hearing about it. I’m tired of constantly having to argue that disabled people’s lives matter, and that society should care when they die or are unable to leave their houses because society is completely hostile to them. I am running out of ways of asking people to care.
