On Monday, the Center for Disease Control altered its recommendations regarding COVID-19. Given the new Omicron variant of the virus, the CDC reduced the recommended isolation time for individuals who test COVID-19-positive from 10 days to five, assuming the person is asymptomatic. The reason for this reduction, per the CDC’s website, is because “the majority of SARS-CoV-2 transmission occurs early in the course of illness, generally in the 1-2 days prior to onset of symptoms and the 2-3 days after.”
On Tuesday, the NFL followed suit and made a significant change to their COVID policy. Effective immediately, NFL players—regardless of vaccination status—are permitted to return to the team after five days of quarantining, provided that the following things are true (via a league memo provided by Tom Pelissero):
- 24 hours have passed since the individual has had a fever without fever-reducing medication
- Other symptoms (e.