The White House downplaying reports that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was weighing new mask guidance for vaccinated people may discourage people from heeding the recommendation as the delta variant of COVID-19 spreads across the country.
Key members of President Joe Biden’s administration minimizing questions about such guidance is the latest misstep by public officials, particularly regarding face coverings, as governments of all levels grapple with the pandemic.
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Public officials have struggled from the start of the COVID-19 outbreak to convey a consistent message as facts changed with the scientific understanding of the respiratory illness, according to Claremont McKenna College politics professor John Pitney.
“Such problems crop up when information is incomplete and the situation is rapidly evolving,” The Politics of Autism author told the Washington Examiner.
Glen Nowak, the director of the University of Georgia’s Center for Health and Risk Communication, agreed.
“To some, this is going to be considered ‘mixed messaging,’ but the reality is public health and medical guidance should change with the situation,” the former CDC spokesman said. “That’s a good thing — although it also means making clear why recommendations are being changed and setting the right expectations.”
The CDC updated its guidance Tuesday, recommending that vaccinated people in communities with high or substantial COVID-19 transmission resume wearing masks indoors. The announcement reverses May’s relaxation of mask guidance when immunization rates were mitigating the virus. It comes, too, as the CDC finds that almost two-thirds of counties are experiencing high or substantial transmission, thanks in part to the more contagious delta strain.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki, who briefed reporters without a mask before the CDC reinstated its mask guidance, described COVID-19 and the data as “evolving.” She underscored that “there’s no playbook and no historic precedent.”
“The reality” is the Biden administration is dealing with a different variant of COVID-19 than it was in the spring, she told reporters. The delta strain became the dominant one in the United States on July 9.
“Our goal is to save their lives and our responsibility, and the responsibility of public health officials, is to continue to provide updated guidance, if it warrants,” she said. “We’re not saying that wearing a mask is convenient or people feel like it, but we are telling you that that is the way to protect yourself, protect your loved ones.”
Yet Psaki was adamant that Biden’s promise concerning “a summer of freedom” and his binary “vaxxed or masked” message would not affect CDC guidance adherence or dissuade people from becoming inoculated against COVID-19.
The president has insisted “the virus hasn’t been vanquished” and “that it was not over,” especially for unvaccinated people, according to Psaki.
“Our hope is certainly that elected officials, leaders, civic leaders, public health experts around the country will also look at the CDC guidance, and they will be constructive partners and voices in sharing with their communities what steps they could take,” she said.
One day prior, Psaki acknowledged that public health experts were having “an active discussion” about the possibility of reissuing mask guidance amid rising COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations, mostly among the unvaccinated. She had spent last week repeating that the CDC had not reached a decision.
“Regardless, the most effective step we can take around the country is to get more people vaccinated. So that is where our focus needs to be, regardless of where the CDC may or may not land on any additional guidance,” she said Monday.
The CDC’s mask guidance development is Biden’s first major COVID-19 backpedal. The White House last month, though, admitted it would not meet its aim to vaccinate 70% of adults with at least one shot by July 4. As of Tuesday, 69% of people 18 and older had received one jab. That figure falls to 57% when it accounts for children 12 and older, who are now eligible to roll up their sleeves.
But foreshadowing future flip-flops, Psaki said Tuesday that federal government “agencies and leaders will look at what steps they should take to protect their workforce and save lives” after the Department of Veterans Affairs this week declared COVID-19 vaccinations mandatory for its healthcare personnel. Psaki had earlier reiterated it was not the federal government’s prerogative to require immunizations.
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Physicians, dentists, nurses, and other VA staff who work with patients now have eight weeks to become inoculated. The department will fund the shot or shots at its own facilities, and employees will be given four hours of paid administrative leave.
