CDC Recommends Vaccinated People Wear Masks Indoors in High Transmission Areas
Summary from the AllSides News Team
The Centers for Disease Control on Tuesday recommended that vaccinated people in areas with “substantial or high” COVID-19 transmission wear masks in public indoor settings. As of Tuesday, 46% of U.S. counties had “high transmission” and 17% had “substantial transmission,” including most counties in most Southern and Western states; every county in Arkansas, Florida and Louisiana had high transmission on Tuesday. CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said the change came after new research showed that vaccinated people with rare “breakthrough” infections could spread the virus as easily as the unvaccinated. The CDC also recommended on Tuesday that K-12 students, teachers and staff wear masks indoors when they return to in-person school, regardless of vaccination status. The CDC previously said in May that vaccinated people no longer needed to wear masks in most indoor settings. However, a surge in cases of the more transmissible Delta variant has led many states to see thousands of new cases per day, mainly among the unvaccinated.
Coverage in left- and center-rated outlets focused more on rising case numbers, sometimes including maps of high transmission areas. Coverage in right-rated outlets focused more on the CDC’s school mask guidelines, with some coverage focusing on criticism from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
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From the Right
CDC ‘Revises’ Mask Guidance: Some Vaccinated Individuals Should Return To Masking Indoors, Everyone Should Mask In K-12 SchoolsThe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is expected to announce Tuesday that it is revising its mask guidance, returning to recommending masking indoors, even for fully vaccinated individuals, in certain circumstances. Most notably, the CDC is expected to announce that everyone in K-12 schools, regardless of vaccination status, should wear a mask.
“In May, the CDC announced that vaccinated individuals were not required to wear masks indoors or outdoors, or physically distance, while maintaining that unvaccinated individuals should continue to wear masks and socially distance,” Fox News noted.
From the Center
CDC: Vaccinated people should now wear masks in high transmission areasThe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday essentially reversed earlier COVID-19 guidance by saying fully vaccinated people should now wear masks in certain situations.
The agency said fully vaccinated people should wear masks in "public, indoor settings" in areas of the country with "substantial" or "high" levels of transmission, as defined by the CDC. Those areas currently include much of the South and West.
The CDC also said all adults and students should wear masks in K-12 schools regardless of vaccination status.
From the Left
CDC updates guidance, recommends vaccinated people wear masks indoors in certain areasTo prevent further spread of the Delta variant, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its mask guidance on Tuesday to recommend that fully vaccinated people wear masks indoors when in areas with "substantial" and "high" transmission of Covid-19, which includes nearly two-thirds of all US counties.
"In recent days I have seen new scientific data from recent outbreak investigations showing that the Delta variant behaves uniquely differently from past strains of the virus that cause Covid-19," CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky told a media briefing on Tuesday.
"This new science is...
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