Dr. Scott Gottlieb In Favor Of Ending School Mask Mandates
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) might have its own threshold for mask mandates to end in America, but Dr. Scott Gottlieb says it's time to consider ending them now, especially in schools.
Gottlieb, the former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), told CNBC Wednesday that given the rise in immunity among Americans, it's time to learn how to tolerate the COVID-19 spread.
“We have a much more contagious variant that is probably going to continue to circulate and you have a population that has much more immunity,” Gottlieb said. "We’re going to probably have to tolerate, and probably should, a higher level of baseline spread at the point at which we consider withdrawing some of this mitigation."
The CDC currently defines low prevalence in the community as less than 10 cases per 100,000 people per day to end masking in schools. Gottlieb said it would be a mistake for the U.S. to wait until they meet that threshold.
“If we hold out, again, if we wait for 10 cases per 100,000 per day in most communities, we’re probably going to be waiting until the summer," Gottlieb said. "We’re going to lose the opportunity this spring to try to return some sense of normalcy in the schools.”
The U.S. has reported a seven-day average of 596,860 COVID-19 cases in the past week, per the CDC, despite the fact that 67.6% of citizens are fully vaccinated. That's a 19.9% decrease from the week prior.
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