In a surprise move that could also impact travel, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) announced that people who are fully vaccinated no longer need to wear masks indoors or outdoors and no longer need to social distance.
CDC Says Masks No Longer Necessary For Vaccinated People
You are considered fully vaccinated two weeks after your second COVID-19 shot (or in the case of J&J, two weeks after your first shot), which provides your body time to develop antibodies. As of today, about 35% of Americans are fully vaccinated with nearly half receiving their first dose.
Several exceptions apply:
- Crowded public places
- Planes
- Busses
- Grocery stores
- Prisons
- Immunocompromised people should still wear masks in consultation with their doctors
- Hospitals or other health care settings
The CDC announced this news during a press conference earlier today.
CDC Director Rochelle Walensky noted:
“Anyone who is fully vaccinated can participate in indoor and outdoor activities, large or small, without wearing a mask or physically distancing. If you are fully vaccinated, you can start doing the things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic. We have all longed for this moment when we can get back to some sense of normalcy.”
How Will New CDC Mask Rule Impact Travel?
I’m just speculating here, but I believe today marks the beginning of the end of mandatory masks on airplanes. The federal mask mandate has been extended until September 13, 2021 and the CDC made clear that masks in crowded places will remain, even singling out onboard airplanes.
But even though the mandate will remain with us this summer, I predict that it will end this autumn and some airlines (though not necessarily all airlines) will begin allowing vaccinated travelers to forgo masks at airports and onboard.
Of course there is concern: the paper CDC vaccination cards are easily forged. But if vaccination numbers continue to grow and the U.S. can reach herd immunity status even with the anti-vaxxer holdouts, then masks can go back to being optional, which should create a welcome relief to gate agents and flight attendants tasked with enforcing the federal mask mandate.
I expect hotels to make masks optional even sooner than airlines. Already, mask enforcement seems to be hit or miss.
CONCLUSION
I’m ready for the mask mandate to end on airplanes because I don’t think young children should have to wear masks. That said, the airline mask mandate will remain in place and even when it is lifted, I plan to continue to wear masks during cold season when traveling. It was lovely not to have a single cold this year…
If you’re on the fence about whether to get vaccinated, please read my thoughts here.
> Read More: My COVID-19 Vaccination Was Not Virtue Signaling
Hmmmm…I don’t know, fully vaccinated dude here, but still…
The science clearly shows that the vaccines stop transmission
Once vaccinated, one should be able to be maskless
It’s almost like-vaccines work. Shocking.
I know, right?!
This is great news. We started the year with a surge of new cases and general fear that public policy would forever be altered by fear of spreading the virus. Now, with cases clearly decreasing and the vaccine effort making successful inroads we’ve definitely turned the corner. What lags behind and what will put the breaks on international travel is vaccination rates other countries.
Kids aren’t vaccinated and so will need to continue to wear masks. Meanwhile, ant-vaxxers will lie about being vaccinated so they don’t need to wear masks and will get our kids sick.
The kids may have to wear masks, despite much lower odds of contracting the virus, but you don’t have to if you are vaccinated…you are highly unlikely to catch it from adults or children…
Typical political decision that throws a huge curveball on businesses that have to make decisions now. How do they plan anyone to know who has been or has not been vaccinated? And how do you think this will work? Will they insert chips on people that are vaccinated? Or do you think that little piece of handwritten paper will do it? For example, you go to the gym. Will they check when you check in if you have been vaccinated? If so, will they issue you a wristband so you can walk around without a mask? As always, people in DC will leave it to businesses to figure out how to deal with it. If they say vaccines work, vaccinated people won’t get sick even if in contact with non vaccinated ones. Just drop this mask nonsense and for the ones that don’t get vaccine it is their problem.
Now drop the testing requirement to come back, for vaccinated people.
@Santastico You last line sums it up, no need to check. Vaccines are available to anyone over 12 now, not really any shortages even. Just eliminate the masks and if you are still worried or not vaccinated, then stay home. If you go out without a vaccine then you are on your own, just like during flu season when people don’t get the flu vaccine. Time for people to take some personal responsibility.
In a trial run of the vaccine I survived five days in Vegas two weeks ago at crowded bars and restaurants with some pretty suspect people around me. I confess to even a night in a karaoke bar (yes, I love them). I came out unscathed. The vaccines work. If I didn’t get Covid there, trust me, they work.
What’s the point of getting vaccinated if not to end the pandemic? And let’s be honest, when compared to the vaccine, masks are essentially worthless.
“people in DC will leave it to businesses to figure out how to deal with it. ”
GOOD! Would you rather clueless DC bureaucrats micromanage small businesses throughout the nation?
too bad you still have no shortage of misinformation-spreading anti-vaxxers out there regularly flying coughcargocultcough (though OPM would never fund that)
Can someone explain to me why a 2-hour long packed concert hall, now exempt from wearing a mask according to the CDC, is a lesser threat than a 30-minute flight from New York to Boston on a plane, which still requires a mask?
@S Because there are no packed concert halls now? Or have been for over a year? Yet there are packed flights. Apples/oranges.
@Adam – No, masks aren’t worthless. They show that you care about your fellow humans (insert sarcasm). Vaccines aren’t nearly as effective because they aren’t obvious. And, by the way, I’m 1) vaccinated and 2) not an anti masker. It’s like the joke “How do you know if someone is a vegan? Don’t worry – they’ll tell you”. I live in downtown Chicago and have gotten dirty looks and, in some cases scolded for months because I walk my dogs in Grant Park – 5+ meters from other people – maskless. I think lots of people will cling to their masks for years as a sign of martyrdom and righteousness.
@Stuart
Yes, but they are saying it doesn’t matter if it’s packed in the concert hall. But does for an airplane? It doesn’t make sense.
When there’s a fifth spike, there will be nothing left to do. Backtracking on masks will look dumb and suggests lying to some people.
Vaccines reduce the chance of infection and the severity of the disease. I dont get your posts If the CDC regulatrs things you scream of big government. When they give a general guidance as above, theyre wrong for not regulating. @santastico
The only “surprising” thing here is that it took the CDC this long to finally admit out loud that the vaccines they are imploring everyone to get…wait for it… actually work! Shocker! They probably should have led with this and we’d probably have millions more vaccinated by now. Dumb things happen when you mix politics with science.
I doubt that we will see an end to the mask mandate on board anytime soon. Reason – those who are refusing the vaccine. They are conspiracy theorists who don’t think the virus is all that much of a risk anyway, so they will also remove their masks. Of course, asking them for proof of vaccine will spur all kinds of constitutional debates as well as comparisons to totalitarian regimes. And these people can’t be “fixed.” They are stupid. So I say keep the airline mask mandate indefinitely.
No one has really talked about this (or maybe I missed it), but airlines, especially United, have been touting their air filtration systems for removing over 90% of airborne bacteria and replacing the existing air with clean air. I’m curious how many confirmed cases of COVID can be traced to air travel. Especially on planes that are half to three quarters full. Matthew? Anyone? It seems to me that airlines should be the first public transportation venue to lift the mask mandate.
Think polio vaccine, think smallpox vaccine, think of the other vaccines that meet the same requirements as those mentioned that, for most people, prevent you from contracting that particular thing. All of those vaccines had to meet certain criteria during development and trials.
These current injections by all of the companies are not vaccines. They do not meet the criteria for a vaccine. They are gene therapy experiments in your body, altering the genes there. These injections will not prevent you from contracting Covid-19. They are not designed for that.
If you have had a mild, or major, case of Covid-19 and developed antibodies you should not get the injection.
The data is out there for you to find.
Follow the science.
If the air filtration systems remove over 90% of the airborne bacteria, that’s great.
However, Covid is not bacteria, it is a virus. Totally different in genetic makeup, transmission and survivability at different scenarios.
Us unvaccinated people been maskless since….always?
Inb4 trumptard
Inb4 flatearther
Inb4 antivax
Bro i just hate needles.
The point you are missing here is the Health Care workers. If you get sick, the Health Care workers still have to treat you. We also don’t know if there are any long term effects from contracting Covid… even if you are vaccinated, there is still a chance you will get sick / have long term effects. Plus, you are also enabling the development and spread of variants. Therefore, in my opinion as a medical doctor, I believe everyone who can / should get vaccinated and still wear a mask.
Matthew – masks protect other people around the wearer, not the wearer. Please stop spreading the myth that wearing a mask somehow protects the wearer. This is only true in hospital settings with airtight (N95) masks. You wearing a mask on a plane during flu season only means you won’t spread your flu to others. My question: Why are you flying with flu anyway???
I’ve long said the same thing on this blog. But I’d still wear a mask if it makes other feel comfortable.