Becker's Clinical Quality & Infection Control

7 INFECTION CONTROL Michigan hospital employees exposed to COVID-19 told to come to work if asymptomatic By Molly Gamble S everal Michigan health systems in November told employees that if they had close or household contact with someone who has COVID-19, they are still expected to report to work until they get their test results, according to the Detroit Free Press. Michigan Medicine in Ann Arbor, Beau- mont Health in Southfield, Munson Health- care in Travis City and other systems have enacted this policy for exposed employees who are asymptomatic. e systems said the policy is necessary to avoid staffing shortages. ey also point to guidance from the CDC, which out- lines "contingency capacity strategies for healthcare facilities," including allowing asymptomatic healthcare workers "who have had an unprotected exposure to SARS- CoV-2 but are not known to be infected to continue to work." Systems said COVID-19 test results turn around within 24 to 48 hours, but those results can take up to five days in areas where testing shortages are causing delays, including at Munson Healthcare. Munson has instructed employees to report for work even if "asked to quarantine by your local health department," as long as they have no symptoms and are awaiting test results. At Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, workers who have "high-risk exposures" to COVD-19 are quarantined for seven days and tested on the seventh day. If their results are negative, they can return to work the following day, a system spokesperson told the Detroit Free Press. n Strained Wisconsin hospitals asking staff to return to work during quarantine By Kelly Gooch M any hospitals in Wisconsin are having workers who were exposed to COVID-19 return to their jobs during their quarantine period due to staffing shortages, said Wisconsin Department of Health Services CMO Ryan Westergaard, MD, PhD, during a Dec. 1 media briefing. Dr. Westergaard said the move indicates that hospitals are operating under crisis standards, which are practices that would not necessarily be considered ideal or safe outside of a crisis. "I would say the area which most hospitals have moved into doing in that regard, that we would consider a crisis standard, is the idea of having health- care providers who have been exposed … come back to work during their quarantine period," he told reporters. "That's something, under normal cir- cumstances, we wouldn't do. In the setting of a staffing crisis, where hospital leadership feels it's more dangerous for patients to keep people home than to have healthcare workers come back to the workplace." According to Dr. Westergaard, his department has provided guidance to hospitals on how to bring workers back during quarantine more safely. This guidance includes aggressive symptom monitoring, enhanced personal pro- tective equipment and regimented serial testing, meaning workers are tested every three days. The CMO's remarks came about one week after the Wisconsin Hospital Association told Becker's 53 hospitals, or 40 percent of hospitals in the state, reported critical staffing shortages as of Nov. 20. n Flu shot rates at record levels this season, but still down for Black children By Erica Carbajal F lu vaccine doses in the U.S. reached 188 million as of Nov. 27, a record number during a single flu season, according to the CDC's Weekly Na- tional Influenza Dashboard Dec. 9 update. Among white children, 2020-21 season flu vaccination coverage is at 50.9 percent, while among Black, non-Hispanic children, coverage is at 33.3 per- cent — an 18 percentage point difference. Compared to the 2019-20 season, vaccination coverage among Black, non-Hispanic children is down 11 percentage points from last season's 44.1 percent coverage. Despite the record number, a November survey from NORC at the University of Chicago found that only about half (49 percent) of U.S. adults had been vaccinated so far. Of the respondents, 35 percent did not plan on getting a flu shot this season. The survey also found 35 percent of respondents said the pandemic made them more likely to receive a flu shot, while 11 percent said it made them less likely. "In the context of the ongoing pandemic, flu vaccination is considered more important than ever to help ensure that influenza illnesses and hospitaliza- tions do not further tax an already overburdened healthcare system," the CDC said. n

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