While much of the reporting of today's CDC announcement on masking guidelines focused on the changing criteria for universal masking, another equally important change is taking place: moving away from the “testing, testing, testing” mantra in favor of a surveillance system based on hospital burden.
The federal agency now says nearly three-quarters of Americans don’t need to wear masks because they live in areas with low or medium community risk from COVID-19.
The dramatic switch comes because the CDC switched from only using COVID-19 cases as a factor and are taking into account other metrics, including hospitalizations.
“This updated approach focuses on directing our prevention efforts toward protecting people at high risk for severe ailments and preventing hospitals and healthcare systems from being overwhelmed,” Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the CDC’s director, told reporters on a call.
The new guidelines are called the COVID-19 Community Levels, and call explicitly for a shift to a surveillance system, using hospitalizations and burdens on local healthcare systems (e.g., ER/ED visits) as well as environmental surveillance.
Health officials and individuals should consider current information about COVID-19 hospitalizations in the community, as well as the potential for strain on the local health system and COVID-19 cases in the community, when making decisions about community prevention strategies and individual behaviors. Communities and individuals should also make decisions based on whether they are at high risk for severe disease and take into account inequities in access to prevention strategies.
COVID-19 Community Levels can help communities and individuals make decisions based on their local context and their unique needs. Community vaccination coverage and other local information, like early alerts from surveillance, such as through wastewater or the number of emergency department visits for COVID-19, when available, can also inform decision making for health officials and individuals.
Fitting in with CDC Director Rochelle Walensky's comments in December about the accuracy of PCR testing, the CDC guidelines also mark a further shift towards the traditional definition of an infectious disease “case".
Follow CDC recommendations for isolation and quarantine, including getting tested if you are exposed to COVID-19 or have symptoms of COVID-19
Focusing testing on symptomatic patients moves the COVID-19 testing paradigm towards that which has been in place for seasonal influenza for years. It also by implication sends Anthony “the science” Fauci's “Five Stages Of A Pandemic” to the trashcan, where they belong.
Ms. Walensky does not come right out and say it but the CDC has effectively declared the “endemic phase” of COVID-19 to have arrived.
The 'pandemic' was completely contrived from the beginning. It never existed save for bogus testing and a fearmongering media. The correct description is 'fraud' and the entire medical community is complicit. Stupidity has always been endemic.
That diagnostic testing could ever be used for epidemiological tracking was an astounding bit of lunacy, from the get go. And it was obvious from the get go.
The bastardization of the clinical language is truly amazing. COVID was ALWAYS an endemic pathogen once it was released. As for there being a pandemic... yeah, that's iffy at best. If you take the test results and case counts at face value, yes, it's been a pandemic. The key word there, of course, is "if". If you slice the test results by 90%, then no, there's not really a pandemic (unless the common cold counts as a pandemic).
Thank you again! I am happy to see this, yet there is no admission of ALL of the horrible mistakes and outright lies! I fear the CDC & other “Public Health” agencies will not be called to account for the harm they have done! Plus the mandates are still in place! Can someone inform the President that this man made Pandemic is over and to drop the Emergency! Now that the MSM has a new shiny object (The War in Ukraine) to grab our attention they hope we will forget about all the unnecessary deaths and injuries caused by the CDC, NIH, FDA, WHO et al, the manufactured pandemonium as Alex Berenson Rightly named it. Will the TRUTH ever be known? Or will these crimes against humanity be swept under the rug?😣😖🥺
The truth IS known, Gwen. The question is whether it will be acknowledged and accepted. I think not. The truth is known about Roosevelt, for example, and he is still revered as a great president.
But what do I know? I'm a three-time college dropout who used to sell diplomas. It was $25 for a Bachelors degree and you had to answer a skill-testing question. A Masters was $50 and you answered a question of your own choice. A hundred bucks bought a Doctorate and we didn't ask any questions. (True story...look up Rochdale College)
Dear ND Martin, I had to laugh about the Diploma Sales. It took me 10 years and blood sweat and tears to get my piece of paper😂😅 But all jokes aside, I wish people knew the Truth. Unless the 100s of people I know live in a bubble, they do not know! I have never in my life people so wedded to the Official Narrative. My family, members of my Religious Community, political organizations, scholars, etc, they believe the official story! It is the scariest thing I have ever seen in my life. For a while, I thought people who refused the jab might wind up in a gulag and that my own friends and family would drag me there. If this is a conspiracy beyond just old fashion greed, they have won! They know how to create mass psychosis. It didn’t take too much. Scare the hell out of people, tell them that they will die if they don’t get the jab, have the media drum it across day and night 24/7 and you can get them to do whatever you tell them to do! I am shocked, disappointed and scared. I now understand the Nazis, what happened in Cambodia and Rwanda. It can happen here. I am clear about that. Thank God for the Truckers in Canada and the brave doctors and scientists who have stood up against the mob. People believe the lies!😖😣
I worked my way through college, first as a security guard, then through a series of clerical accounting jobs (my bachelor's is actually in accounting, even though I have been in IT for over a quarter century).
When it comes to technology I'm entirely self taught -- and that includes at last count ten computer programming languages.
None of which is to brag on myself (not entirely, at least!). Rather, it's to illustrate my belief that education really is a matter of what you put into it.
It's never about the degrees. It's about the knowledge.
Nothing but respect for those who EARNED their sheepskins.
A neighbor (and good friend...a semi-retired pharmacist) stopped by today with a mask on. I said he looked like a complete fool wearing the loose surgical diaper and asked him to take it off, which he reluctantly did. We were outside in a below-freezing breeze. As I stepped forward to converse, he stepped backward. I stepped forward again and he backed up again. I faked a step and he backed up and that did it. I launched into a tirade about masks and the entire phony pandemic. I told him that I was not sick and said 'there is no such thing as asymptomatic transmission'. I made him repeat this. He has COPD and I explained how the masks impaired his breathing. It was all good-natured and we swapped a few stories, but I am amazed at this intelligent, professional man acting so fearful. I hope I can get through to him and break the grip that the media has on his mind.
The 'pandemic' was completely contrived from the beginning. It never existed save for bogus testing and a fearmongering media. The correct description is 'fraud' and the entire medical community is complicit. Stupidity has always been endemic.
That diagnostic testing could ever be used for epidemiological tracking was an astounding bit of lunacy, from the get go. And it was obvious from the get go.
https://allfactsmatter.substack.com/p/testing-is-a-failure-at-tracking
The bastardization of the clinical language is truly amazing. COVID was ALWAYS an endemic pathogen once it was released. As for there being a pandemic... yeah, that's iffy at best. If you take the test results and case counts at face value, yes, it's been a pandemic. The key word there, of course, is "if". If you slice the test results by 90%, then no, there's not really a pandemic (unless the common cold counts as a pandemic).
"Fraud" is definitely the right word to use here.
Thank you again! I am happy to see this, yet there is no admission of ALL of the horrible mistakes and outright lies! I fear the CDC & other “Public Health” agencies will not be called to account for the harm they have done! Plus the mandates are still in place! Can someone inform the President that this man made Pandemic is over and to drop the Emergency! Now that the MSM has a new shiny object (The War in Ukraine) to grab our attention they hope we will forget about all the unnecessary deaths and injuries caused by the CDC, NIH, FDA, WHO et al, the manufactured pandemonium as Alex Berenson Rightly named it. Will the TRUTH ever be known? Or will these crimes against humanity be swept under the rug?😣😖🥺
The truth IS known, Gwen. The question is whether it will be acknowledged and accepted. I think not. The truth is known about Roosevelt, for example, and he is still revered as a great president.
But what do I know? I'm a three-time college dropout who used to sell diplomas. It was $25 for a Bachelors degree and you had to answer a skill-testing question. A Masters was $50 and you answered a question of your own choice. A hundred bucks bought a Doctorate and we didn't ask any questions. (True story...look up Rochdale College)
Dear ND Martin, I had to laugh about the Diploma Sales. It took me 10 years and blood sweat and tears to get my piece of paper😂😅 But all jokes aside, I wish people knew the Truth. Unless the 100s of people I know live in a bubble, they do not know! I have never in my life people so wedded to the Official Narrative. My family, members of my Religious Community, political organizations, scholars, etc, they believe the official story! It is the scariest thing I have ever seen in my life. For a while, I thought people who refused the jab might wind up in a gulag and that my own friends and family would drag me there. If this is a conspiracy beyond just old fashion greed, they have won! They know how to create mass psychosis. It didn’t take too much. Scare the hell out of people, tell them that they will die if they don’t get the jab, have the media drum it across day and night 24/7 and you can get them to do whatever you tell them to do! I am shocked, disappointed and scared. I now understand the Nazis, what happened in Cambodia and Rwanda. It can happen here. I am clear about that. Thank God for the Truckers in Canada and the brave doctors and scientists who have stood up against the mob. People believe the lies!😖😣
I worked my way through college, first as a security guard, then through a series of clerical accounting jobs (my bachelor's is actually in accounting, even though I have been in IT for over a quarter century).
When it comes to technology I'm entirely self taught -- and that includes at last count ten computer programming languages.
None of which is to brag on myself (not entirely, at least!). Rather, it's to illustrate my belief that education really is a matter of what you put into it.
It's never about the degrees. It's about the knowledge.
Yeh. I quit college to get an education.
Nothing but respect for those who EARNED their sheepskins.
A neighbor (and good friend...a semi-retired pharmacist) stopped by today with a mask on. I said he looked like a complete fool wearing the loose surgical diaper and asked him to take it off, which he reluctantly did. We were outside in a below-freezing breeze. As I stepped forward to converse, he stepped backward. I stepped forward again and he backed up again. I faked a step and he backed up and that did it. I launched into a tirade about masks and the entire phony pandemic. I told him that I was not sick and said 'there is no such thing as asymptomatic transmission'. I made him repeat this. He has COPD and I explained how the masks impaired his breathing. It was all good-natured and we swapped a few stories, but I am amazed at this intelligent, professional man acting so fearful. I hope I can get through to him and break the grip that the media has on his mind.
You may enjoy this piece from Jeffery Tucker at Brownstone: https://brownstone.org/articles/a-new-age-of-barbarism/
It's an interesting perspective.
My own views are shaping up somewhat differently, but Tucker is always a worthwhile read.
Thank you! SCARY & I am afraid true!