A more accurate portrayal of the CDC in zombie movies pic.twitter.com/JaTcFiJwAM
— Ryan Ken (they/them) (@Ryan_Ken_Acts) December 28, 2021
wsws | Anger is growing in the working class in the United States in response to Monday’s announcement by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that it was shortening its guidelines for quarantining for positive cases from 10 days to five. In remarks to the press, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky and Biden’s top COVID adviser Anthony Fauci admitted that the purpose of loosening the restrictions is to ensure the supply of labor for American businesses. This occurs while the surge of the Omicron variant is expected to infect 140 million Americans in the next three months, more than 40 percent of the country.
The announcement amounts to an abdication by the federal government of any pretense of attempting to contain the pandemic. Instead, workers are being told that they must learn to live—and to die—with the virus, in the name of protecting the “economy,” a euphemism for the profit margins and share values of the major corporations. It follows a televised address last week by President Biden in which he rejected new lockdowns of schools and workplaces, and even encouraged Americans not to cancel their holiday travel plans.
However, the spread of the virus itself among airline workers forced the cancellation of thousands of flights. An appeal to the CDC by the heads of major airlines is what immediately prompted the change to quarantine guidelines.
The announcement has stunned and angered workers, who are being confronted with the fact that the corporate and political establishment consider their lives and those of their friends and relatives expendable. One tweet by a worker who was instructed to come to work even though his roommate tested positive was liked more than 360,000 times and retweeted 44,000 times. Workers flooded the replies to the tweet with their own horror stories from work and school.
One such tweet read, “I'm a high school teacher and when I was told two weeks ago during lunch that the group of people I had dinner with tested positive I told my admin that I was leaving to get tested. The [New York City Department of Education] told me if I didn't have any symptoms, I would be docked a half day. I was positive.”
Another tweet read, “My granddaughter’s Daycare sent a text last night that said one of the care givers had tested positive but is asymptomatic and will still be coming to work. Just a heads up in case someone didn’t want their kid exposed. Unbelievable.” Another said, “My sister's workplace told her to just come to work because you could test positive for 3 months so it doesn't matter if you come to work. and they didn’t tell other employees when someone got covid. gotta love america.”
Workers across the country spoke to the World Socialist Web Site.
One Southern California nurse said, “To be honest, I have lost a lot of trust in the CDC. This is the same organization that told us it was okay to come to work wearing a bandana [in the opening weeks of the pandemic, in response to widespread mask shortages]. I get it—the country wasn’t prepared and there weren't enough N95s, but they put us at risk and a lot of people got sick.
“Then we were told by Fauci, ‘If you’re vaccinated you won’t get it and you won’t spread it.’ That was also a lie and they have really undermined the legitimacy of the CDC. This is a big issue because it has played into the hands of people denying that COVID exists.”
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