It for sure is risky. But most patients don't even get tested unless they have respiratory symptoms or if they're being discharged to a facility that requires testing. Administration cares about the bottom line, not patient/employee safety.

I can't even count the number of times I've cared for a patient for days to weeks only to have them test positive when the time came to send them to rehab.

Smaller practices (like a dentist) tend to be more vigilant in testing because the people they're exposing are mainly the staff and it hurts the bottom line if they get sick. In hospitals it hurts the bottom line to know people have covid because then you have to isolate them. If you don't know you can put them in a room with someone else.

I work on a unit that does chemo and we regularly have covid positive patients on our unit, no matter how much we scream about it being unsafe.

They barely screen patients, I'm not sure why they'd screen visitors.

I work as a bedside nurse in a different hospital and I agree that the policy is ridiculous. They let people visit covid patients assuming they don proper PPE.

If this had happened in the summer of 2020 when things were less understood, I could have given some leeway for people "just doing their job" but in 2022 we've learned enough to protect people while still allowing for compassion.