Weekly Rounds with Infection Control Today: Delta Will Burn Itself Out, Son of Delta, Colin Powell’s Breakthrough Infection

Here are 5 highlights from ICT®’s wide-ranging coverage of the infection prevention and control world. Everything from interviews with known opinion leaders, to the news that infection preventionists and other health care professionals can use on their jobs.

Delta Variant of COVID-19 Will Burn Itself Out

Jason Tetro, author of The Germ Code and The Germ Files: “Moving forward, I think we’re going to be going into this idea of seasonality, or as I like to say, cold, flu and COVID-19 seasons.” And the so-called "monster variant"? It's already here, says Tetro. It's called Delta.

Breakthrough COVID-19 Infection Kills Colin Powell

More frequent testing and continuation of mitigation measures such as masking would better help to protect the more vulnerable among us such as Colin Powell, a study concludes.

‘Son’ of COVID-19 Delta Variant on Scientists’ Radar

The UK Health Security Agency says that as of September 27, about 6% of sequencing tests in the UK tested positive for the Delta descendant—AY.4.2—which some scientists estimate may be 10% more infectious than original Delta.

Troubled Water Makes for Sick Hospitals

Brian Flannigan: “The reason why water quality and water safety is so important in sterile processing is that there have been direct connections made between the water systems and hospital infections: operating room infections, asset life problems, maintenance problems, staining and discoloration of equipment.”

Sterile Processing Unscripted: Know When to Innovate

IAHCSMM’s Damien Berg: “COVID-19 put a light on sterile processing professionals in a positive way. We became a force multiplier in the hospital by the things we did. And we got known.”