STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – For more than a year now, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has urged us to follow the science when to comes to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The governor hasn’t just urged us to do so, he’s hectored us about it over and over again. Let the experts manage things, not the politicians, Cuomo has raged.
So why is Cuomo turning his back on science now?
Because he can.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday said that vaccinated people no longer needed to wear face masks in most indoor settings.
The CDC had previously said that the vaccinated did not need to wear masks outside either.
Coming on the heels of widespread re-openings, loosening of lockdown rules and the elimination of many capacity limitations in public places, it should be a celebratory time.
But not in Cuomo’s New York. Cuomo on Thursday said that he wasn’t ready to lift the state’s mask mandate quite yet.
“In New York, we have always relied on the facts and the science to guide us throughout the worst of this pandemic and in our successful reopening,” Cuomo said in a prepared statement.
Except for now, when the facts and science, from the scientists at the CDC, say that mask mandates can be significantly loosed.
Cuomo said that he and state Health Commissioner Dr. Howard Zucker, along with other experts, would study the guidance and make a decision from there.
Great. These are the same people who crafted the policy that shunted COVID-positive patients into nursing homes, leaving a holocaust of death and grief in their wake.
The very least that Cuomo should do is lift the mandate but allow stores and other establishments to decide for themselves if they will require facial coverings.
Then we as customers can decide whether to patronize businesses that go against CDC mask guidance.
Doesn’t Cuomo trust the science that tells us of the benefits of vaccination? Or is he one of those vaccine dreaded skeptics?
But Cuomo isn’t alone in clinging to the power that allows him to keep pandemic fear percolating.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said that lawmakers would have to remain masked on the floor of the House of Representatives despite the CDC’s new guidance. This even though it appears that members and staff will be allowed to go without masks in offices and other parts of the U.S. Capitol.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif., adjusts her face mask as she speaks to the media, Wednesday Dec. 30, 2020, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)AP
How is that based on science? And how many times have we seen a mere handful of lawmakers present in the House chamber doing business? Under Pelosi’s rule, they’ll have to mask up as if they’re in the mosh pit at Bonnaroo.
Pelosi said that only 75 percent of House members have been vaccinated. Those are actually pretty good numbers compared to other segments of society. I think House members can roll the dice.
Even President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris went without masks at a meeting with lawmakers in the White House on Thursday. First Lady Jill Biden also did without a facial covering during a visit to a high school in West Virginia.
Nope, not good enough for Cuomo.
Now would be a good time for state lawmakers, so eager to carve back Cuomo’s pandemic powers, to step in and do away with the mask mandate.
It would be a good time for Mayor Bill de Blasio to challenge Cuomo on masks.
Go ahead. We’ll wait.
We shouldn’t be surprised. This is the same Cuomo who didn’t follow science when it came to bars and restaurants.
The governor’s own numbers showed that transmission was low in those settings, but Cuomo still shut the businesses down last fall. And upon reopening kept capacity levels lower in city bars and restaurants than in other parts of the state.
None of it was based on science. It was based on Cuomo fiat.
It’s time for the governor to relent.
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