- The CDC updated its isolation guidance for COVID-19 and states that a 5-day isolation period following a positive test result is no longer needed.
- Under the new guidelines, people will not need to isolate if they are fever-free for at least 24 hours without medication and if their symptoms are mild and improving.
- Public health experts say it was the right time to revise the guidelines.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated isolation guidelines for COVID-19 in 2024.
This means if you have COVID-19, you can return to your regular activities within 24 hours if your symptoms are improving and if you are fever-free without medication.
Health experts agreed that a five-day isolation period was no longer necessary. However, the CDC still
“It aligns with COVID becoming less severe,” Dean Blumberg, MD, Chief of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at UC Davis Health told Healthline in an earlier interview.
“The mortality rate is now approaching that of influenza, which was not true earlier in the pandemic when it was four to five times higher than influenza. We don’t have any kind of special isolation rules for the general public for influenza… so this would be similar to what the recommendations are for influenza or other community-associated respiratory illnesses,” Blumberg added.
Blumber explained there were several factors that led to the CDC’s decision to end the five-day isolation rule.
“One of them is because people have a much higher level of immunity to COVID now because of vaccination or previous infection, so the acute infection is less dangerous for most people,” he noted. “If [you] do get sick, there’s Paxlovid that’s available that can decrease the severity of illness.”
A positive COVID-19 test does not require a five-day isolation period under the new CDC guidelines.
If you’ve been fever-free for at least 24 hours without the use of medication, and your symptoms are mild and improving, you can resume your regular activities.
The new recommendations are more closely aligned with the agency’s guidance on avoiding transmission of RSV and the flu.
William Schaffner, MD, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University, told Healthline in an earlier interview, the CDC’s updated isolation guidelines came at the right time and was an appropriate public health response.
“This is… a matter of how well does this work to achieve the goal of reducing transmission. I think there are many people who have said for some time, this is not working very well at all. It’s not really materially contributing to a reduction in transmission,” he said.
COVID-19 rates have stabilized around the United States despite new variants that continue to emerge. Even as variant XFG, known as “Stratus,” becomes the dominant variant in the United States and globally, health officials say the overall public health risk
The CDC no longer recommends updated COVID-19 shots for healthy adults, pregnant people, and children. However, vaccination against COVID-19 can help protect against severe illness, especially among vulnerable groups.
Older people, the immunocompromised, and people with certain underlying health conditions are at an increased risk of severe illness from COVID-19. Receiving updated COVID-19 shots and taking additional precautions, like wearing a mask, can help protect these groups.
“Those who are most vulnerable should still take extra precautions that many young healthy people who don’t have comorbidities will not be taking,” Blumberg said. “I continue to recommend masking for those people who are more vulnerable.”