"Seminario cited the recent report, “Employer-Reported Workplace Injuries and Illnesses,” that shows that the number of respiratory illnesses in the private health care and social assistance sector increased from 145,300 in 2021 to 199,700 cases in 2022, an increase of 37.5 percent.
...
As an industrial hygienist, Seminario was extremely critical that there were no experts in respiratory protection on the committee nor did it include engineers who developed ventilation guidelines. She believes that the HICPAC committee members are likely so opposed to respirators “because once you are into recommending respiratory protection, with that comes a full respiratory protection program from OSHA,” with penalties for violations.
An epidemiologist and consultant, Michael Olesen, echoed this, believing the changes reflect “pressure to remove liability from hospitals.” He added, “I take a very clear position that we should be having respiratory protection mandates in all healthcare settings right now.”
...
Many patients who spoke at the HICPAC meetings said they had gotten Covid-19 when they went to the hospital and that the new policies were keeping them from getting care.
Given that, Dr. Art Caplan, professor of medical ethics at New York University’s Grossman School of Medicine, previously told me that dropping masking requirements in hospitals is “utterly, completely, irresponsible.” Similarly, staff refusing to mask, even when a patient requests it, is a moral failure. “The first principle is, you must do what is in the best interest of your patient,” he said.
...
Several people were asked why they believe HICPAC is determined to water down protections. Consistently, respondents say, “to reduce liability.” Earlier in the pandemic, hospitals regularly tested patients and staff for Covid-19, and you could often tell where and how you became infected. Since staff are no longer masking and continue working when ill, and patients are not being tested on admission, you can no longer prove who infected you. Hospitals are the only ones who win in this scenario, absolving themselves of responsibility and liability."
A CDC advisory group has recommended relaxing infection control protections despite ongoing hospital-acquired Covid19 and risk of new emergi
— HICPAC supports surgical masks for airborne pathogens, sick workers returning after 3 days
With Democratic administrations like these, who needs Republicans?
by Sophie Putka
Members of the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC) voted Friday to defend what some have called weak standards of infection control for healthcare settings, agreeing nearly unanimously that surgical masks provideopens in a new tab or window adequate protection against airborne pathogens, and that sick healthcare workers may return to work after 3 days of viral respiratory symptoms without testing.
The meeting centered largely on written responses to CDC questions pushing backopens in a new tab or window on draft guidelinesopens in a new tab or window to prevent transmission of pathogens in healthcare settings, and on proposed updates to a section of a separate guidelineopens in a new tab or window for infection control in healthcare personnel from 1998.
HICPAC, which advises the CDC and HHS on infection control practices, has faced an outcryopens in a new tab or window from some healthcare workers and occupational health experts since the beginningopens in a new tab or window of its guideline revision process in 2023. Critics have condemned the proposedopens in a new tab or window infection precautions as woefully inadequate for protecting healthcare workers and patients, and called for more transparent processes, along with input from those representing their concerns.
HICPAC has since made adjustments, such as adding members to its voting contingent and workgroup. This includes two leaders from a group that has been among its loudest critics, National Nurses United (NNU): Lisa Baum, MA, the lead occupational health & safety representative at the New York State Nurses Association, an NNU affiliate, and Jane Thomason, MSPH, lead industrial hygienist for NNU. Baum is one of 11 HICPAC voting members and Thomason serves on the HICPAC workgroup.
Despite the concessions, HICPAC voted to approve language that kept the recommendationsopens in a new tab or window largely the same. Though HICPAC's guidelines are not mandatory, most healthcare employers use them to guide their infection control practices.
Michelle Gutierrez Vo, RN, president of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, an affiliate of NNU, told MedPage Today, "We're not surprised, you know, it's not something that we thought was going to be easy. But it doesn't deter us."
"They need to be preventing illness, and they need to be sitting at the highest level to make sure that people don't get sick," Vo added. "And if they don't do that, then they're failing."
Vo and others noted that HICPAC's members are largely administrators and managersopens in a new tab or window from institutions including academic research centers and health departments, but also hospitals and health systems with a vested interest in keeping costs down. Throughout the deliberations, Baum stood in stark contrast to the rest of the HICPAC members, arguing for stronger language, and was nearly the sole "disapprove" vote in all six of the items voted on.
Defending the Draft
CDC asked four key questionsopens in a new tab or window about the isolation precautions guidance when it sent the draft back to HICPAC earlier this year. For the first question, members approved language stating that "N95 respirators should not be recommended for all pathogens that spread by air."
As for the draft's "routine air precautions," it recommended the use of "masks" -- including surgical masks -- for "common, often endemic, respiratory pathogens that spread predominantly over short distances."
To a question about voluntary use of N95 respirators by healthcare staff, the workgroup voted to respond, in part, that the guideline should not include this as a direct recommendation. Language that "clearly supports the concept of voluntary use of N95" masks should be left in the "narrative" portion of the relevant section, the group decided.
Finally, the workgroup responded that a blanket recommendation for source control -- the use of masks to prevent transmission of pathogens from the mask-wearer -- was not needed.
As for the healthcare personnel guidance, HICPAC recommended workers stay home for 3 days after the onset of a confirmed or suspected respiratory virus, returning if they are fever-free for 24 hours, have improving symptoms, and "feel well enough to return to work." After the return to work, they should wear a mask until day 7 from onset.
This decision came after reviewing data compiled from a number of studies, from which the workgroup estimated that most viral transmission occurs within the first 5 to 7 days of the primary case.
Public Pushback
Noticeably frustrated public commenters called for universal masking in healthcare settings, better evidence reviews, and stronger protections for healthcare workers and immunocompromised people.
"Who's going to send the memo to all the firefighters that they should start using surgical masks for wildfire smoke? [Or] to the lab workers that work with other infectious diseases like tuberculosis, bird flu, or whatever else pops up that can spread by the air?" asked Shea O'Neil, a volunteer at the World Health Network and Air Support Project. "Just let them know to put down those coppers and N95s and throw on a baggy blue surgical mask, because it probably works just as fine."
"It's a risk you all are willing to take today, and somehow you've been put in this position to decide for us. That's not the precautionary principle," O'Neil said, calling for N95 respirators or better as a standard precaution.
"If folks are symptomatic, then they should be home [until] they're not symptomatic -- 3 or 5 days does not handle the issue," said commenter Don Ford, a COVID-19 safety and long COVID advocate. "I hear the committee discussing what is best for hospital management when your role is to determine what is best healthcare practices. The group is not called 'hospital management practices.' It's Health Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee."
Demand the hospital industry put patients before profits!
I don't see posts about this on here so here's a link to the current petition by National Nurses United urging the CDC to reject the recently approved draft by the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee to the CDC to weaken infection control standards.
If these standards go through preventable infections will increase for both patients and healthcare workers, which would be bad enough even if we weren't in the middle of a pandemic.
The People’s CDC Hosts “People’s Meeting” to Protest Dangerous Potential US CDC Guidelines on Infection Control in Healthcare Settings
Join us.
WHAT: Virtual protest against proposed guidelines from CDC advisory board (HICPAC) that would severely weaken infection control standards for healthcare
Listen now (35 mins) | Don't Wait For Everybody - Episode 003
Moving testimony from someone named Liv Grace, and I read off a "you agree to get COVID waiver" someone had posted in the past that they had to sign... not at a concert or a conference - but at the doctors.
The CDC HICPAC meeting took place in the afternoon and it was streamed live on Youtube, with public comments at the end.
Then they made it private. A public meeting about infection control in healthcare - they made it private. It's an outrage.
You can find pieces of recordings online, but you shouldn't have to go searching for a copy of a PUBLIC MEETING.
I wrote to my reps and to President Biden at the White House contact page and I really hope other people will write to complain about this too. The public meeting and public comments should be available for people who could not attend a meeting at 12 noon on a weekday!!
