Democrat-led states have recently begun easing up on masking requirements, using declining COVID-19 case numbers as the reason instead of scientific evidence.
New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, California, Oregon and Delaware have all announced new policies regarding masks.
Earlier this week, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy told MSNBC “We felt with a four-week runway, based on our dropping in cases, hospitalizations, in-school transmission, increasing in vaccinations, God willing the under-5 kids being eligible sooner than later, a little bit warmer weather a month from now — that combination has allowed us to take this step”.
New Jersey’s mask mandate for schools and day cares will be lifted on March 7.
Connecticut will be lifting its statewide mandate by Feb. 28. After that, it will be up to local school officials to decide what policies will be followed.
Gov. Ned Lamont aid Monday, “Connecticut is seeing a dramatic decline in cases caused by the Omicron variant, and children over the age of 5 have had the ability to get vaccinated for more than three months now”.
“With this in mind, I think we are in a good position to phase out the requirement that masks be worn in all schools statewide and shift the determination on whether to require this to the local level,” he added.
Gov. John Carney of Delaware said “We’re in a much better place than we were several weeks ago”. The statewide school mask mandate will expire at the end of March and the indoor mask requirement will end Feb. 11.
Though it is not lifting school mask mandates yet, California is getting rid of its indoor mask mandate next week for those who are vaccinated.
Dr. Tomás J. Aragón, California’s public health officer, stated, “With things moving in the right direction, we are making responsible modifications to COVID-19 prevention measures, while also continuing to develop a longer-term action plan for the state”.
New York is also not removing masks in school yet, but Gov. Kathy Hochul pointed out downward trends in cases, positivity rate, and hospitalizations as a reason to lift the indoor mask mandate.
“This is trending in a very, very good direction,” she said Wednesday. When asked about high schools, she explained that students are in “a very concentrated setting” without a lot of freedom to move and said “adults can make their own decision”.