CDC to Tell Americans to Wear Cloth Masks, Save Medical Masks for Health Workers

The White House announced yesterday that it will likely soon adjust previous guidelines discouraging non-health workers from wearing face masks, to be published as "guidance" from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), reports TechCrunch . The new guidance is expected to concern cloth and non-medical face coverings exclusively due to persistent shortages of medical masks for health workers. White House Coronavirus Task Force Response Coordinator Deborah Birx said in the Thursday briefing that the updated guidance was an "additive" protective measure as opposed to a substitute. She implied that the White House and CDC were hesitant to offer the new mask advice due to concerns that people would ease social distancing measures that are essential to containment of the coronavirus epidemic. Memos indicate that the CDC began considering the cloth mask recommendation on account of evidence that asymptomatic people are transmitting the virus. A draft copy of the policy declares that the agency "recommends the community use of cloth masks as an additional public health measure people can take to prevent the spread of virus to those around them."