The U.S. has made significant progress fighting the coronavirus since the FDA authorized the Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson vaccines. Developing the vaccines began during the Trump administration — Operation Warp Speed — and the Biden administration moved swiftly to deploy the vaccines across the country, which are now available to almost everyone.
The efficacy of the vaccines, probably aided by warmer weather and individual caution, has led to a significant decline in infections and deaths, so significant that the CDC announced on Thursday that the fully vaccinated can go maskless in many places, even inside.
Weekly average COVID-19 cases and deaths in the United States through May 14, 2021.
Notably, the CDC did not provide cart blanche permission for throwing away masks. Its announcement says
Fully vaccinated people can resume activities without wearing a mask or physically distancing, except where required by federal, state, local, tribal, or territorial laws, rules, and regulations, including local business and workplace guidance.
The wording is interesting. Yes — sort of. The CDC is shifting responsibility for deciding "to mask or not to mask" to local communities and businesses, without any guidance or plan to determine who has been vaccinated.
If a business asks customers to continue wearing masks, it may alienate those who have been vaccinated. If it follows the CDC guidelines — Costco, Starbucks, Trader Joe's, and Walmart plan to do so — it must trust anyone who has not been vaccinated, including the anti-vaxxers, to wear one. Asking for proof of vaccination will create a quagmire worse than when businesses first tried to enforce masking.
Perhaps the risk of infection is low enough to warrant the CDC's move, yet the Biden administration is muddying the already murky water we've been swimming through the past year.
On the other hand, this new policy may be a deft political move by the Biden administration: claim success for the vaccination effort and declining cases and "reward" those who have been vaccinated. Depending on the situation, they can decide whether to continue wearing a mask. The unvaccinated, who are most at risk of getting COVID-19, can exercise personal liberty and choose whether to wear a mask. If they do get sick, while unfortunate, it's arguably a consequence of the freedom to choose. Ironically, it seems the Biden administration is giving them what they have wanted all along.
Postscript: despite the administration's mantra that they follow the science, the rationale behind the CDC's decision is not incontrovertible. Infections and deaths are down, yet the rate of vaccinations is declining, and the number of people vaccinated is below what's needed for herd immunity. Joshua Gans, author of Plugging the Gap, found the CDC decision confusing and inconsistent with the agency's conservative culture.
There is still a global pandemic. We are not at the stage where we can do anything that looks like declaring victory. So this bad policy in my opinion.
