New guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urge even vaccinated Americans in more than 60% of U.S. counties to mask again due to the rapid spread of the Delta variant.
The announcement comes out just weeks after the public was led to believe the COVID-19 pandemic was over.
Less than a month ago, thousands of nurses, doctors, firefighters, and other frontline workers marched in New York City without masks to celebrate “the end of COVID restrictions” in place since March 2020, meant to protect citizens from the threat of the pandemic .
The new guidance will apply to indoor public settings in states where COVID-19 activity surpasses at least 50 new cases per 100,000 people in the last 7 days.
Federal officials also urge teachers, students, visitors and staff to wear a mask in K-12 schools regardless of their vaccination status.
The reintroduction of COVID restrictions will not be limited to mask wearing. Just yesterday, President Biden announced that requiring all federal workers to get vaccinated was “under consideration.”
This requirement as well as regular testing will be extended to all federal employees and contractors, reported CNN on July 27.
“That’s under consideration right now, but if you’re not vaccinated, you’re not really as smart as I thought you were,” said Biden. “The more we learn about this virus and the delta variation, the more we have to be worried and concerned. And there’s only one thing we know for sure — if those other 100 million people got vaccinated, we’d be in a very different world,” he added.
Biden claims are backed by strong data. After a rapid start, the vaccination progress has suffered a sharp and worrying decline just when the numbers should be picking up.
Data collected by USAFacts shows that in 16 states less than 50% of the population have received one dose of a vaccine as of today.
Alabama Governor Kay Ivey recently said that conservative media must be held accountable for promoting conspiracy theories and spreading fake news leading millions of Americans to reject vaccines.
It is “time to start blaming the unvaccinated folks” for rising the pandemic caseload and spreading misinformation about the vaccines.