A group of public health experts is urging the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to update infection control practices that currently don’t incorporate COVID-19 best practices. The outcome could have a significant impact on protocols used by long-term care centers.
The team of epidemiologists, industrial hygienists, healthcare worker union representatives and aerosol scientists was expected to send another letter to the CDC this week. The team wants the CDC to hold public meetings to discuss Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee’s (HICPAC’s) proposal to update the CDC’s Isolation Precautions guidance, which hasn’t been updated since 2007. The guidance protects residents and healthcare workers.
HICPAC, a federal advisory committee, hasn’t made a formal proposal to update the guidance. But it made a presentation this summer that outraged more than 900 public health experts and supporters who are concerned the guidance doesn’t take into account everything that healthcare workers learned during the pandemic about COVID-19 transmission. The guidance weakens procedures for isolation, the group said. Lisa Brosseau, an expert on respiratory protection for workers, said the proposed guidance is full of errors, citing a slide that said surgical masks are as effective as respirators to stop the spread of airborne diseases.
At that time, the team urged CDC Director Mandy Cohen, MD, for more stakeholders to be involved in updating the standards.
Bob Harrison, MD, of the University of California-San Francisco and the founder of the UCSF Occupational Health Services, said HICPAC needs to use experts outside of hospital management.
“We need to hear from experts who are aerosol scientists and the principles of particle physics and distribution in the air,” he said. Harrison explained that research showed that infectious agents like COVID can spread with really fine particles through the air over long distances.
“The draft recommendations fail to reflect what has been confirmed about aerosol transmission by inhalation during the COVID-19 pandemic,” the petitioners said in a July 20 letter. “The draft recommendations do not adequately provide for the proper control measures — isolation, ventilation, and NIOSH-approved respirators — to protect against transmission of infectious aerosols.”
The CDC responded to the petitioners’ letter, saying it will get feedback after the recommendations are sent to them — something that’s supposed to happen in November. Brousseau said that’s too late to get the ball rolling.
“What did we learn from COVID? It seems like nothing, according to HICPAC,” Brosseau said. HICPAC’s proposal recommends that healthcare workers use respirators for measles and tuberculosis.
Michael Lin, MD, co-chair of HICPAC, told CIDRAP News he was not able to provide a comment on the draft guidelines, or the language used in any proposals or slides.
