by Mish Shedlock, The Maven:
In a move sure to cause confusion the CDC Removes Guidelines Saying Coronavirus Can Spread From Tiny Air Particles.
For months, the CDC said the new coronavirus is primarily transmitted between people in close contact through large droplets that land in the mouths or noses of people nearby. On Friday, however, it added that tiny particles known as aerosols could transmit the virus. Then abruptly on Monday, the CDC reversed course and removed the additions. Much of the guidelines’ earlier description of Covid-19 transmission, emphasizing spread via large droplets, was restored.
The agency last week walked back a controversial recommendation that close contacts of Covid-19 patients don’t need to get tested if they don’t have symptoms.
“The tide had turned toward science when the CDC said” aerosol transmission is possible, said Joseph Allen, a health scientist and director of Harvard University’s Healthy Buildings program, which studies how buildings affect human health. “It was a watershed moment where people would believe this.” “To backtrack instantly is devastating,” he said.
Expert Opinion
Aerosol and respiratory viruses experts have been arguing for months that Covid-19 is an airborne virus, pointing to studies of outbreaks that have shown that the new coronavirus spread even when close contact among people was avoided.
More than 200 scientists asked public-health agencies, in a letter published in July in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, to acknowledge airborne transmission of Covid-19.
Aerosol transmission makes sense given the super-spreader church and choir transmissions we have seen.
Huge?
