The CDC announced today that fully vaccinated Americans no longer need to wear facemasks while inside. NPR. The policy is based on studies of vaccinated people in the United States and Israel. There are exceptions to the new policy as the mask mandate for federal transportation services, like planes and trains, will remain in force for everyone. Masks can also still be required by local mandates and by businesses and workplaces. And people who have not been vaccinated are still recommended to wear the masks.
My Comment:
This policy is long overdue. Not only did it make zero sense to have fully vaccinated people continue to wear the masks, it also took away one of the main reasons to actually get the vaccine. Not having to wear a mask all the time is a major reason why low risk people would want the vaccine but the Biden admin and the CDC never did anything about it until now.
Though I approve of this move, I think it's going to be a very ugly few days for anyone that works in a job that has to enforce mask mandates. Those jobs tend to be tough already but with this CDC announcement there are going to be a ton of people that will ignore local or business mandates and cite the CDC as the reason why. Given that there was no lead up to this announcement, businesses have not had any time to readjust their policies.
There is also the problem of how anyone is going to know who is actually vaccinated or not. I know they released those stupid vaccine cards but I know I am not comfortable showing mine to people and I doubt many people who are vaccinated will want to show theirs off. And it would be trivially easy for an unvaccinated person to just lie about being vaccinated in order to ditch the mask. Plus there are a ton of fake vaccine cards out there already circulating in case people do start checking them.
I think a lot of people will likely get sick from this. Not from the Coronavirus mind you but from every other disease that the masks have been preventing. People will be catching colds at a pretty high rate and once flu season begins in the fall people will be catching it again. I know in my case, last year when everyone was super serious about masks, I didn't get sick once. But this year when everyone got sick of them and mandates were eased? I have already gotten two colds this year, including the one I have now and am slowly recovering from.
I also worry that many of the people who have worn masks for the entire pandemic might have weaker immune systems now. Without regular exposure to germs bad things can happen to an immune system. I think a lot of children will develop allergies and people may be more vulnerable to disease after they ditch the masks.
The effect this will have will vary from region to region. I know in my state masks had pretty much been ditched outside of businesses that required it. People generally no longer wear them outside and only wear them inside if a business requires it. But I know Wisconsin is not America and other states will have different reactions. For here it's just a shrug, but for states that have been under mask mandates for the duration it will be a major relief.
Will some people still be wearing masks? Probably. For many people on the left wearing a mask had little to do with the virus and a lot to do with hatred of people who didn't want to wear a mask. And there are quite a few people that are way more concerned with the disease then they really should be. I think there is an argument for the Asian model of mask wearing, wear it when you are sick, but I think many people will just continue to wear it regardless of what the CDC says.
Is there a chance that the CDC will reverse this mandate? I think it's possible. The media is hyping up what is happening in India right now and saying the Coronavirus variants there are more dangerous. I don't see what is happening in India happening in the United States as we are not a country that smears cow dung on ourselves to treat the virus. And before you call me racist, let me point out that it is actually happening over there.
Despite the troubles in India I think it is clear that the Coronavirus pandemic is on the way out. With so many people now immune to the virus, either due to the vaccines or natural immunity, the virus has few people that it can infect. Without new hosts the virus will eventually die out and I think by the fall the virus will be nothing but a bad memory. Fingers crossed!
No comments:
Post a Comment