Anthony Fauci, MD: How SARS-CoV-2 Is Most Likely Spread

Guidance from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) came under scrutiny last month when reports showed dissent between federal leadership-pushed language on SARS-CoV-2 transmission and testing parameters, and the members of the CDC who emphasized science-informed measures.

What eventually manifested was a series of amended and removed guidances on the CDC’s website, the most recent of which weighed in on the topic of SARS-CoV-2 aerosol versus droplet transmission risk debate.

Last week, Anthony Fauci, MD, director of the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), joined Lungcast, a respiratory health podcast series from sister publication HCPLive® and the American Lung Association (ALA).

On the topic of the CDC’s varying messages, Fauci admitted he wasn’t sure of where the agency stood.

“I just know it is likely that there is some degree of aerosol transmission,” he said. “I don’t know to what extent it is responsible for transmissions.”

Fauci also provided perspective on the current state of transmission risk in community gatherings including college campuses, suggesting a strategy of minimal-risk infection management that would allow for classes and programs to continue (mostly) unaffected.

“The perfect scenario would be that if a college had the capability, when a student got infected—and students will get infected—they had the capability of putting them on a separate floor of a dorm, or in a completely separate dorm, where they could comfortably recover, because most of the time they’re going to be very sick,” he said.

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• Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1F3u1hKrwxi9snSQ0q3nti​
• Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/lungcast/id1524712350