The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is clarifying changes to the COVID-19 isolation guidelines for those who test positive.

The agency shortened the isolation and quarantine periods from 10 days to five days for people who are asymptomatic to get essential workers back to work quickly and safely.

"After five days of onset of symptoms, there is much lower - not zero - but much lower chance that you'll be highly contagious to other people," says Dr. Aaron Glatt of Mount Sinai South Nassau.

People can end their isolation only if they have been fe​ver-free for at least 24 hours without medication and other symptoms are resolved or are resolving.

The CDC still is recommending that everyone wear a mask for an additional five days, but so far are not requiring a negative test to get out of isolation or quarantine.

"You need to fulfill the criteria to leave isolation and then you need to go and take additional precautions once you've left isolations that should mitigate to an extremely large extent, significant illness from being transmitted," Glatt says.