No More Masks

No More Masks

By: Elsie Drake | 3/10/22

On March 2, 2022, New York State schools were no longer required to adhere to a mask mandate, meaning that students and faculty alike did not have to wear masks in schools. This decision, made by governor Kathy Hochul, has come with both immense support and immense backlash. Many believe that COVID has long since been a threat, and the lifting of the mandate is long overdue. On the other hand, many believe that this decision came out of nowhere, seemingly for citizen comfort rather than the safety of immune-compromised people.

One concern that many New Yorkers held was the idea that COVID cases may rise, or that cases may be more extreme than we have seen with the recent Omicron variant- which many have described as no worse than a common cold.

Onondaga County, specifically, is an area that many have worried about as it has consistently been an “orange” or “red” county throughout the pandemic, often ranking in the highest cases per capita of New York State.

Since March 2nd, however, new COVID cases in Onondaga County have been rapidly decreasing, with the exception of March 5th, hitting a record low of 0 new cases on March 4th. While this 0-number is definitely an outlier that contradicts current trends, this gives us a goal to strive towards. Positive COVID tests are also at a low of 6%, a much lower number than Onondaga County has seen in the past few months.

Onondaga has previously lifted (and reinstated) mandates for masks in businesses and public property, however schools have remained subject to the mandates throughout the entire pandemic. With this mandate being lifted, as well as what looks like a step in the right direction with the decrease in COVID cases, this might just be the beginning of the end; the start of our return to normalcy.