WHEN TO DITCH THE MASK? When you live deep in Trumpland

 

The decision about when to wear a mask and take other anti-COVID measures should be straightforward. Listen to your state’s Department of Health and follow their recommendations and mandates. However, for those of us living in deep red states with governors that are vying for the title “top Trump toady,” it’s more complicated. They’re not going to tell us when we can stop wearing masks in public because they never recommended masks to start with. Add the politicizing of the issue on top of that, and determining when to pull the plug on wearing a mask is a lot less straightforward than it ought to be.

The Guidance

Fortunately, the CDC has guidance that can help keep those of us with a negligent state Department of Health safe. Here’s the guidance in a nutshell:

1. Masks are required for everyone on planes, buses, trains and other public transportation, and in the transportation terminals.

2. Anyone over 2 years old who isn’t vaccinated should wear a mask in public indoor spaces.

3. Generally, you don’t need to wear a mask outside unless there is a high level of local transmission and you’re in a crowded space.

4. People who have a weakened immune system should continue to wear a mask until advised otherwise by their healthcare provider.

5. Vaccinated people should continue wearing a mask at public indoor spaces if they live in an area with high or substantial transmission.

Community Transmission

It’s that last one that needs some explanation. What exactly constitutes high or substantial transmission? The CDC has established guidelines that are tracked at the county level across the nation to make this determination. For most vaccinated people to go to public indoor spaces without a mask they recommend that the percentage of positive test fall below 8% and the number of new positive cases in the last week to fall below 50 per 100,000 persons in that county. If only one of those standards is met, it defaults to the higher level.

Image from the CDC

Here in Escambia County in Northwest Florida we’ve just met this standard. After seeing falling numbers for the last month, just 4.9% of test are coming back positive, with 45.6 new cases per 100,000 people. You’d think the local government would be celebrating this, but since we’ve never been under a mask mandate there’s been no mention of hitting this milestone. So, for the first time since before the delta variant hit, the residents of our country can safely go to the grocery store unmasked. But what about the rest of the country?

Image from CDC

As you can see from this map Escambia County is somewhat of an outlier. Most of the country is still red or orange. I randomly checked some of these counties and is seems the numbers are trending downward in most areas. If this trend continues, more of us will be faced with the dilemma of when to stop wearing a mask. You can click this link to check the status of your county. Of course, for those of you lucky enough to have health departments that are on the job you should follow their guidance. There’s also every possibility that the trend could reverse itself and we might be back in the mask at some point.

Where it Gets Complicated

Follow guidance from your department of health, or in the absence of that, following the CDC guidelines, easy peasy. Except of course nothing is ever that easy. The whole issue of wearing a mask has become more than a simple issue of following the advice of public health officials. Last summer when the CDC announced wearing mask was no longer required, there were a lot of people who continued to wear them anyways. I suspect that here in the Florida panhandle, just meeting the community transmission matrix won’t have a big impact on the number of people wearing masks in public.

For many people, wearing a mask has become more than a simple question of science and public health. Clearly, for many, they were going to refuse to wear a mask regardless of official recommendations. For people on the opposite end of the political spectrum, wearing a mask has become a symbol of political unity just as much as not wearing a mask was for people in the MAGAverse. Even if the science says the masks aren’t necessary, going out in public without one is to don the attire of Trump’s anti-intellectual groupies. It just doesn’t feel right.

The New Normal?

The decision to continue wearing a mask in public even after your community has reached a moderate transmission level isn’t entirely tribal. There are still new COVID infections occurring, and we’ll be getting into the cold and flu season in the coming months. Some people in Asia have worn masks in public long before this pandemic to safeguard against any number of contagions in the environment. Just because the risk is low doesn’t mean people are obliged to accept that risk. It’s not an unreasonable step to take for those who want to avoid being infected by a virus, COVID or otherwise.

If someone has made a reasoned decision to continue wearing a mask, no one should question that decision. Still, most people I know are looking forward to safely going out in public without a mask. Despite that, many are reluctant to take that plunge and go out barefaced to the mall. We trusted the scientists when they told us we needed to wear a mask to combat the virus. Once the conditions no longer warrant wearing a mask, it’s time to trust the science again in making the decision to take them off.