Current COVID-19 guidelines follow a simplified, symptom-based approach. The CDC no longer recommends a fixed five-day isolation period. Instead, you can return to normal activities once your symptoms are improving overall and you’ve been fever-free for at least 24 hours without using fever-reducing medication. After that, you should take extra precautions for the next five days around other people.
When to Stay Home
If you develop respiratory symptoms that aren’t explained by another cause, stay home and away from others, including people in your household who aren’t sick. Symptoms that warrant staying home include fever, chills, fatigue, cough, runny or stuffy nose, sore throat, headache, muscle aches, loss of taste or smell, diarrhea, and wheezing, among others.
You’re clear to resume normal activities when both of these have been true for at least 24 hours: your symptoms are genuinely improving, and you haven’t had a fever without the help of medications like ibuprofen or acetaminophen. There’s no minimum number of days you must stay home. The timeline depends entirely on how quickly your body recovers.
If you return to your routine and then develop a new fever or start feeling worse, go back home and restart the process. Wait another 24 hours of improvement and no fever before heading out again.
Extra Precautions for the Five Days After
Once you’re back to normal activities, the CDC recommends five additional days of precautions to protect the people around you. These include wearing a well-fitting mask when near others, improving ventilation or spending time in spaces with cleaner air, keeping physical distance when practical, and washing your hands frequently. You can also test to confirm you’re no longer contagious. These steps matter most around older adults, people with weakened immune systems, and young children.
How to Test and Read Results
Home antigen tests (sometimes called rapid tests or self-tests) produce results in 15 to 30 minutes. A positive result is reliable. A negative result, however, doesn’t rule out infection, especially early on or if you don’t have symptoms yet.
The FDA recommends repeating negative tests 48 hours apart. If you have symptoms, two negative tests spaced 48 hours apart give reasonable confidence you’re not infected. If you don’t have symptoms but were exposed, you need three negative tests, each 48 hours apart, to be confident. If your first test is negative and you have symptoms, you may have simply tested before the virus reached detectable levels. Test again in two days.
What to Do After an Exposure
If you’ve been in close contact with someone who tested positive but you feel fine, you don’t need to isolate. You should, however, monitor yourself for symptoms, wear a mask around others, and keep extra distance when possible. Testing after an exposure helps you catch an infection early and decide whether you need treatment. These precautions are especially important if you spend time around people who are at higher risk of severe illness.
Vaccination for 2024-2025
The CDC recommends everyone ages six months and older get the updated 2024-2025 COVID-19 vaccine, regardless of whether they’ve received any previous COVID vaccines. Like the flu shot, COVID vaccines are now updated seasonally to better match circulating variants.
For most healthy people, one dose of the updated vaccine is all that’s recommended for the current season. Two groups are advised to get a second dose six months after their first updated shot: adults 65 and older, and anyone six months or older with moderate or severe immune compromise. The minimum interval between those two doses is two months, which allows flexibility if someone’s risk level or circumstances call for faster protection.
People with significant immune compromise may receive three or more doses of the current season’s vaccine, based on a conversation with their healthcare provider about individual risk. Vaccination also appears to help prevent long COVID. A meta-analysis of observational studies found that even a single vaccine dose cut the risk of developing long-lasting symptoms by roughly 46% compared to being unvaccinated.
Antiviral Treatment
Prescription antiviral treatment is available for people at higher risk of severe COVID-19. To be eligible, you need to be at least 18 (or at least 12 and weighing 88 pounds or more), have mild to moderate symptoms, and have at least one risk factor for severe disease. Risk factors include older age, obesity, diabetes, heart disease, chronic lung conditions, and immune-suppressing conditions or medications, among others.
Timing matters. Antivirals work best when started within the first few days of symptoms. Beyond reducing the chance of hospitalization, early antiviral treatment may also lower the risk of long COVID. One meta-analysis of observational studies found that taking antivirals early cut the likelihood of developing prolonged symptoms by about 27.5% compared to going untreated. If you test positive and have risk factors, contact a healthcare provider promptly to discuss whether treatment makes sense for you.
Masking in Healthcare Settings
In everyday life, masking is a personal choice informed by your risk level and local conditions. In healthcare settings, the picture is more structured. The CDC recommends that hospitals and clinics institute facility-wide masking when COVID-19 hospital admission levels in the community are high, defined as more than 20 new COVID admissions per 100,000 people over a seven-day period. Some facilities may also require masks in higher-risk areas like emergency departments or when caring for immunocompromised patients, even outside surge periods.
If you’re visiting a hospital, clinic, or nursing home, check the facility’s current policy before you go. Many require masks regardless of community transmission levels, particularly during fall and winter respiratory virus season.
Schools and Children
The same symptom-based guidelines apply to children. Kids should stay home when they have respiratory symptoms, return when they’ve been fever-free for 24 hours and are improving, and take extra precautions for five days after returning to school or activities. For youth sports, the CDC advises that coaches, players, and families all follow these same criteria. Any child who has tested positive or been in close contact with someone who has should stay home and monitor their health before resuming practice or games.