Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky said Tuesday that nationwide mask mandates in schools will continue to be the rule of the land, per a recording obtained by Reason.
THE QUOTE
During a closed-door House briefing, Walensky insisted that science supports the mandates — even after she was told that other countries have rejected them and a favorite CDC study on masking kids has been thoroughly debunked, Reason reported based on the leaked audio.
- “The CDC provides guidance. Our guidance currently is that masking should happen in all schools right now,” Walensky said, though she shirked responsibility for the policy when pressed.
- “I will also say that guidance is just guidance, and all of these decisions, we’ve continued to say, have to be made at the local level. As cases come down dramatically, we have deferred our guidance to the local jurisdictions.”
- “Given that many coronavirus-cautious jurisdictions are seemingly waiting for the CDC’s permission to relax masking requirements — in schools, especially — this answer prompted some outrage,” Reason noted.
The next day, during a public White House briefing, Walensky suggested the CDC might be open to easing its recommended masking requirements, at least on a temporary basis.
- “We must consider hospital capacity as an additional important barometer. We want to give people a break from things like mask-wearing when these metrics are better, and then have the ability to reach for them again should things worsen,” she said.
MEANWHILE
With the omicron-variant-driven surge of COVID-19 cases receding and midterms fast approaching, Democrat-run states, from New York to California, have started to defy the Biden administration on mask mandates and other pandemic restrictions.
- Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak, a Democrat, lifted the statewide mandate Thursday, and a viral video showed the joyous reaction of students at one Las Vegas elementary school.