In this week’s edition of Spotlight Politics:

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky says the latest alteration in COVID guidelines was meant to make recommendations easier to comply with, and to focus isolation to when people are most infectious.

The CDC updated the recommended isolation period for asymptomatic COVID-19 positive individuals from 10 days to five, followed by five days of wearing a mask when around others to minimize risk of transmission.

“We have seen relatively low rates of isolation for all of this pandemic,” Walensky said. “Some science has demonstrated that less than a third of people are isolating when they need to. And so we really want to make sure that we had guidance in this moment where we were going to have a lot of disease that could be adhered to, that people were willing to adhere to, and that spoke specifically to when people were maximally infectious.”

The CDC has faced criticism from public health officials and physicians for this move. 

This comes as COVID is surging across the country — including in Illinois — and as public officials warn residents to be cautious during New Year’s celebrations.

Meanwhile, Mayor Lightfoot’s vaccine mandate for some indoor spaces goes into effect Monday, alongside Cook County’s mandate.Though some restaurant owners are asking Lighfoot to postpone the vaccine mandate to give them more time to prepare.

Our Spotlight Politics team of Amanda Vinicky and Paris Schutz take on those stories and more.