COVID-19 can spread more than six feet, warns US CDC

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the United States has warned of “repeatedly documented” instances of COVID-19 spreading through the air to people more than six feet away under certain conditions.

The new document explains the latest understanding of how the virus spreads is part of a shifting emphasis towards the airborne transmission of the virus.

“Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 from inhalation of virus in the air farther than six feet from an infectious source can occur,” the new document says in large letters while noting it is “less likely than at closer distances.”

The risk of this kind of spread is highest indoors in places with “inadequate ventilation,” when people are shouting or singing, or when people are exposed for long periods of time, the CDC said.

Some experts have been pushing the CDC for months to place a greater emphasis on airborne transmission and the need to improve ventilation, even with something as simple as opening the window in a room. Experts have also long said that the outdoors is far safer than indoors.

In October, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said COVID-19 can spread through virus lingering in the air, sometimes for hours, acknowledging concerns widely voiced by public health experts about airborne transmission of the virus.

In its guidance, CDC said there was evidence that people with COVID-19 possibly infected others who were more than 6 feet away, within enclosed spaces with poor ventilation.

Under such circumstances, CDC said scientists believe the amount of infectious smaller droplets and particles, or aerosols, produced by the people with COVID-19 become concentrated enough to spread the virus.