Doctors in Seattle call for masks to be mandatory for healthcare workers again – amid rise of new Covid variant BA.2.86

Calls for masks to return are mounting amid rising Covid rates and new variants emerging.

An Atlanta university became the first since the government declared the pandemic over to mandate masks for students and staff just a week after classes began.

And in an editorial from the American College of Physicians (ACP), government doctors and public health experts in Seattle called for face coverings to be mandated again in all healthcare facilities.

They claim that hospital patients are at greater risk of dying from or becoming seriously ill from Covid and would benefit from ‘reducing(d) risk of hospital-acquired Covid among patients and healthcare workers’.

The 10 experts – from the Seattle & King County Health Department and the University of Washington – said we need to find “ways to adapt to this new reality” rather than “accepting unnecessary risks to patient and caregiver health.” ‘.

It comes as a rumor of masking public gains after the CDC said it was monitoring the new Covid variant BA.2.86.

Morris Brown College, a private liberal arts college, is requiring students and staff to wear face masks on campus for two weeks due to “reports of positive cases among students at Atlanta University Center.”

The college said it had not received any reports of cases on campus. A letter called on students to keep their distance and banned all parties and large student gatherings for two weeks.

Georgia’s Covid case count has risen for three weeks in a row, but overall infection and hospitalization rates remain low.

Meanwhile, the academic paper was probably written before the new variants came to light and before US hospital admissions started to rise.

Earlier today, one former FDA boss said to be ‘quite concerned’ the variant known as BA.X, BA.2.86 or Pirola, that is ‘highly mutated’ and therefore probably better at escaping the immune system of vaccinated or previously infected people.

Dr. Scott Gottlieb acknowledged there is no evidence that the variant is more deadly than older versions of the virus, but Covid fatalities in the US are already starting to rise, though they remain near historic lows.

However, hospitalizations and deaths are now on the rise in the US, although these are from historic lows and are still well below this time last year.

This is according to the article that appeared in the magazine on Monday Annals of Internal Medicinethe ACP academic medical journal, said there is “logic to integrate precautions,” including “the ongoing burden of disease among those at greatest risk of severe Covid-19, the high proportion of transmission of asymptomatic and presymptomatic cases, uncertainty about the future course of the pandemic and the effects of post-Covid-19 conditions.’

Statements in the journal do not necessarily reflect the views of the ACS.

The researchers acknowledged that the number of Covid cases has fallen dramatically since the pandemic due to vaccines, antivirals and heightened community immunity, but said “serious consequences” are still occurring as a result of the virus.

They argued that patients in hospitals are much more vulnerable due to age and underlying conditions.

The authors added: ‘If we are to accept the benefits of more frequent mask wearing in clinical settings, we must find ways to adapt to this new reality rather than accepting unnecessary risks to patient and caregiver health.

“Maybe instead of removing masks to improve rapport building and perceived empathy, we can find ways to improve masked communication.”

Patients should also be able to “request that their healthcare providers wear a mask if they feel it is appropriate,” the commentary said.

The authors said the masking could take different approaches, such as in healthcare settings in targeted settings such as transplant, oncology and geriatric wards, where the risk is highest for patients, but noted that this is a “less desirable” option.

It can also be done during certain months of the year when the respiratory season is at its highest, depending on where the hospital is located in the US, or when the burden of respiratory viruses on the community reaches a level that is considered too high.

They refer to Washington State, where healthcare organizations decided to expand universal masking in patient spaces, with individual facilities “given the flexibility to tailor policies to their own unique spaces.”

When Biden ended the Covid national emergency, the Covid measures were meant to be dropped Good.

But some British scientists – known for making gloomy predictions earlier in the pandemic – are so concerned about the new Covid variants that they have advised people to mask up again.

Masks have long been a controversial Covid strategy due to the lack of hard evidence that they are effective.

One of the most comprehensive meta-analyses of face coverings found that masks made “little to no difference” to Covid infection or death rates in community settings.

The debate around masks first turned sour in 2020 when health officials flipped their effectiveness.

Then-NIAID director Dr. Anthony Fauci said in 2020 that masks “didn’t provide the perfect protection that people think it is.”

He later suggested that people should wear masks as a sign of “respect” for others. He admitted to lying to the public about the effectiveness of masks in preventing panic buying and preserving masks for healthcare workers.

The agency still recommends that Americans wear masks in places with high levels of transmission, such as on public transportation.

Critics of masks claim they have hindered communication and children’s development and progress in school.

Increases in RSV and winter flu have been attributed in part to face-covering mandates because they prevented children from developing natural immunity to other diseases.