On Friday Feb 25, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) outlined new measures to drop its mask recommendation for ‘most Americans live in places where healthy people, including students in schools’. According to the Associated Press (AP), the CDC is reportedly focusing on Covid hospitalization rather than the currently positive tests matrices.

“The new system greatly changes the look of the CDC’s risk map and puts more than 70% of the U.S. population in counties where the coronavirus is posing a low or medium threat to hospitals. Those are the people who can stop wearing masks,” writes the AP quoting the CDC.

“Anybody is certainly welcome to wear a mask at any time if they feel safer wearing a mask. We want to make sure our hospitals are OK and people are not coming in with severe disease. … Anyone can go to the CDC website, find out the volume of disease in their community and make that decision.”

– CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky in a news briefing (source: Star Tribune)

The CNN Health writes: “New CDC metrics indicate that about 28% of people in the United States live in a county where they need to wear masks indoors. Previously, CDC pointed to levels of coronavirus transmission within communities as a key metric for restrictions and recommended that people in areas with high or substantial levels of transmission — about 99% of the population — should wear masks indoors.”

“We’re in a better place today than we were six months ago, six weeks ago, six days ago. Now it’s time to focus on severity, not just cases, of COVID. Because of all the hard work that’s been done and the many tools we’ve developed to tackle COVID, we can ease the guidance on mask use — not everyone in every place needs to wear a mask.”

– ,US Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra in a statement to CNN

Andrew Noymer, a public health professor at the University of California (Irvine), told AP “With many Americans already taking off their masks, the CDC’s shift won’t make much practical difference for now. But it will help when the next wave of infection — a likelihood in the fall or winter — starts threatening hospital capacity again.”

• New CDC Covid-19 metrics drop strong mask recommendations for most of the country
• CDC: Many healthy Americans can take a break from masks

Commenting on the CDC’s new guidance Dr. Gerald Harmon, president of the American Medical Association, told to CNN “The updated CDC recommendations reflect ‘a new approach‘ for monitoring Covid-19 in communities. But even as some jurisdictions lift masking requirements, we must grapple with the fact that millions of people in the U.S. are immuno-compromised, more susceptible to severe COVID outcomes, or still too young to be eligible for the vaccine. In light of those facts, I personally will continue to wear a mask in most indoor public settings, and I urge all Americans to consider doing the same, especially in places like pharmacies, grocery stores, on public transportation — locations all of us, regardless of vaccination status or risk factors, must visit regularly.”

“Although masks may no longer be required indoors in many parts of the U.S., we know that wearing a well-fitted mask is an effective way to protect ourselves and our communities, including the most vulnerable, from COVID-19—particularly in indoor settings when physical distancing is not possible,” said Dr. Harmon.

Dr. Walensky assured Americans “If or when new variants emerge or the virus surges, we have more ways to protect ourselves and our communities than ever before.”