For many disabled and immunocompromised people, hospital settings are a significant threat to health and safety. Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, nosocomial- or healthcare acquired- SARS-COV-2 infections have been an additional risk for sick and vulnerable people seeking care. As of today, there have still been no updates to national-level guidance to reflect that SARS-COV-2 was determined to be airborne in 2021.

Those who are the most well-informed about COVID, who know which variants are circulating, how to check wastewater levels, who encourage testing in their social circles and calmly continue to mask in public, have a more adult, emotionally mature relationship with the pandemic. They understand that denial is no remedy for fear, and delusion no refuge.

Refusal to directly communicate 1) how COVID spreads 2) that it can be avoided 3) how it can be avoided while modeling mitigation, makes pandemic communications much more difficult for vulnerable people, activists and marginalized groups attempting to reduce disease burden in their communities. We should not be swimming against the current of public health officials’ poor pandemic hygiene.