TAMPA, Fla. — One day after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced new mask guidelines for vaccinated Americans, the largest nurses' union in the nation criticized the move.
As of Thursday, the CDC eased mask-wearing guidance for fully vaccinated people, allowing them to stop wearing masks outdoors in crowds and in most indoor settings.
On Friday, National Nurses United (NNU) condemned the guidance.
In a news release, NNU Executive Director Bonnie Castillo, RN said, "This newest CDC guidance is not based on science, does not protect public health, and threatens the lives of patients, nurses, and other frontline workers across the country."
She added, "Now is not the time to relax protective measures, and we are outraged that the CDC has done just that while we are still in the midst of the deadliest pandemic in a century.”
The NNU listed specific concerns with the new guidance including:
- A continued high number of COVID cases in the United States
- Circulation of COVID variants of concern that are more transmissible, deadlier, and possibly vaccine-resistant
- Unanswered questions about vaccines. Nurses emphasize that it’s unclear how well vaccines prevent asymptomatic and mild COVID infections, how well vaccines prevent transmission of the virus, and how long protection from vaccines will last.
- Lack of infection data. The nurses' union says the CDC will no longer be tracking infections among fully vaccinated people unless they result in hospitalization or death. This means that the CDC is no longer tracking data necessary to understand whether vaccines prevent asymptomatic/mild infections, how long vaccine protection may last, and to understand how variants impact vaccine protection.
- Unsatisfactory guidance based on aerosol transmission. Nurses say the CDC needs to fully recognize aerosol transmission and update its COVID guidance accordingly to prioritize measures that prevent and reduce aerosol transmission (ventilation, respiratory protection, testing to identify asymptomatic cases).
- NNU wants more prevention, not less. Nurses say this includes masks, distancing, and avoiding crowds and large gatherings—in addition to vaccines. Importantly, it also includes protecting nurses and other frontline workers from workplace exposure to the virus. Vaccines are only one important component of a robust, public health infection control program.
- The recent guidelines are unjust and will disproportionately harm Black, Indigenous, and people of color.
“There has been so much inequity in the vaccine rollout and racial inequity in who is a frontline worker put most at risk by this guidance. The impact of the CDC’s guidance update will be felt disproportionately by workers of color and their families and communities,” said NNU President Zenei Triunfo-Cortez, RN.
National Nurses United said the new CDC guidance underlines the importance of OSHA ( Occupational Safety and Health Administration) issuing a long overdue OSHA emergency temporary standard (ETS) on infectious diseases without delay.
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