WASHINGTON – Students and teachers vaccinated against Covid-19 will not need to wear masks in United States classrooms when school resumes in the fall, said health authorities yesterday.
The new guidance follows the recent federal approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 shot for Americans aged 12 to 15, with hospitalisations and deaths down sharply since January – but cases beginning an upward trajectory due to the surging Delta variant.
The Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in May announced that vaccinated Americans could drop masks, but the health advice for schools was not immediately changed accordingly.
“Indoors: mask use is recommended for people who are not fully vaccinated, including students, teachers and staff,” said the nation’s leading federal public health agency in its updated guidance.
Schools are free to follow the guidelines or ignore them, said CDC.
“Based on the needs of the community, school administrators may opt to make mask use universally required (i.e., required regardless of vaccination status) in the school.”
Reasons for continuing to enforce mask use may include high transmission rates in schools and their localities, or simply “difficulty monitoring or enforcing mask policies that are not universal”.
Health officials stressed that returning to in-person learning in the fall is a “priority”.
“Achieving high levels of Covid-19 vaccination among eligible students, as well as teachers, staff and household members, is one of the most critical strategies to help schools safely resume full operations,” said the guidance. – AFP, July 10, 2021
