Masks At California Schools Will Continue To Be Required, Even As Indoor Mandate Is Lifted This Week

deadline.com:

California Director of Health and Human Service Dr. Mark Ghaly today confirmed that after tomorrow the state will “move from a requirement to a strong recommendation of indoor masking.”One place where masks will still be required, however, is in the state’s schools.

He said California’s “science-driven approach” would be to keep the mandate in place for kids in grades TK-12 and then in two weeks, on February 28, reassess the need for face coverings in schools.

He said he thought, at that point, “with some specificity that we will be able to give a date when the requirement will move to a recommendation.” Ghaly indicated that one prime consideration is the low vaccination rates among CA kids under 11 years old.The conditions that indicated the decision were that that cases had started to come down dramatically, according to the director.Also, tThe so-called “R-effective” had dropped below 1, which means that every person infected would go on to spread the virus to less than 1 other person.Since January 14, daily cases have dropped over 75%, test positivity is down about 73% and hospitalizations are down more than 40%, he said.

Deaths, however, are still rising. Ghaly noted those are a lagging indicator which generally rise and fall weeks after changes in cases and hospitalizations.“We are anticipating that in the coming weeks, deaths will decline as well,” said Ghaly. “The idea that we’ll continue to see reductions in numbers is key to the decisions we’re making now.Ghaly announced that it’s ok to take off your mask in California starting this week— unless you’re unvaccinated.