The biggest news this week was that CDC changed their isolation policy. Their new guidance includes a reduction in the isolation period after a positive test from 10 days to 5 days for asymptomatic individuals regardless of vaccination status. They also changed the quarantine period to 5 days after exposure. Importantly, though, they recommended wearing a mask for 5 days after isolation and quarantine.
If I were in the room, I would have depended on four seminal studies published (here, here, here, here) before Omicron. Together the results suggest a broad range of an infectious period ranging from 3-9 days… In short, the viral load increased to an infectious rate about 2 days before symptoms until about 4-5 days after symptoms… On average, viral clearance is about 5.5 days among vaccinated compared to 7.5 days for unvaccinated people.
Not updated for Omicron.
