484: Back-to-School Air Quality, HAI Outbreak Framework

ROBERT JOHNSON: 

This is the award-winning Public Health Review Morning Edition for Thursday, August 17, 2023. I'm Robert Johnson. Now, today's news from the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials.

KERRY WYSS: 

These federal guidance documents are huge and are really big steps forward and setting indoor air quality targets for indoor spaces and should be really helpful for the upcoming school year.

JOHNSON: 

The pandemic showed the impact of air quality on public health in school buildings. Kerry Wyss, says ASTHO held focus groups to find out what states have done to address air quality concerns.

WYSS: 

So, we learned that states mainly refer to national guidance for ventilation air cleaning practices, such as that from EPA, CDC, Department of Education, or ASHRAE. Some states did develop their own guidance early in the pandemic, but some of that is already outdated or currently not in use.

JOHNSON: 

Organizations surveyed said most of this work gets done at the local level.

WYSS: 

We did hear about some challenges with state-level implementation of indoor air quality management programs. A lot of this is implemented at the local level. So, looking to school systems, school superintendents, and also really the individual school. The principals and facilities managers ultimately make the best decisions or the final decisions for their schools.

JOHNSON: 

Wyss says ASTHO members looking to do more can also refer to the latest CDC guidance.

WYSS: 

Well, this spring, CDC updated their school ventilation guidance document, so that is a really good resource to start with. They added a discussion on how much ventilation is enough with recommendation to get at least five air changes per hour of clean air in an occupied space.

JOHNSON: 

You can read ASTHO's report about school ventilation, and the work happening in 11 states using the link in the show notes.

Public health agencies are talking about the best way to provide notifications when there's a healthcare-associated infection. Dr. Dawn Terashita says the Council for Outbreak Response, also known as CORHA, met recently to discuss possible approaches.

DAWN TERASHITA: 

We had a roundtable discussion where we discussed a frameworks document that we created as part of CORHA, which discusses the implementation of a notifications framework in the context of healthcare outbreaks.

JOHNSON: 

Part of the discussion focused on the need to streamline outbreak response.

TERASHITA: 

Now, we tried to create a framework document that is easy to follow for jurisdictions so that when they have an outbreak, they can easily follow who needs to be notified. On a basic, basic level, patients who are involved in an outbreak need to be notified.

JOHNSON: 

Terashita says there's a need for a unified notification process.

TERASHITA: 

Patients have the right to understand what's happening in their health care as well as make informed decisions. This frameworks document has been a very important effort with our council members, including ASTHO members, to put on paper some efforts to standardize how to notify: how to notify, who to notify, when to notify, and why it's very important to notify.

JOHNSON: 

You can read the CORHA Principles and Practices for Outbreak Response by clicking the link in the show notes.

Also, today, young people need to know more about reproductive health, but getting their attention can be difficult. O'Keyla Cooper has more.

O'KEYLA COOPER: 

ASTHO's Contraception and Access Learning Community is hosting a virtual discussion on engaging adolescents in sexual and reproductive health care and education on September 6, from 3 to 4 p.m. Eastern time. The webinar will explore current trends in adolescent sexual and reproductive health and feature two organizations sharing successful strategies for engaging adolescents and their SRH care and education. Registration is open, the link can be found in the show notes.

JOHNSON: 

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That'll do it for today's newscast. We're back tomorrow morning with more ASTHO news and information. I'm Robert Johnson. You're listening to the award-winning Public Health Review Morning Edition. Have a great day.