Written by Miguel Palacios
As reported in the Covid-19 update this month, California has managed to make a quick recovery as far as covid cases are concerned. In March, California had an extremely high number of infections and was lacking in its vaccine rollouts. However, over the past two months, California has made quick work of getting vaccines out to the general public allowing for a majority of California counties to be placed into Orange Tier.
Now that California is well on its way to returning to normal, some officials and agencies are taking a step back. Earlier this month, the Centers for Disease Control stated that individuals who have been fully vaccinated did not need to wear facemasks anymore. This has led to a lot of unrest and confusion among the people as some state and municipal health departments have not officially validated that claim.
Another confusing aspect is from the World Health Organization, who in their guidelines for covid-19 safety, states that a distance of at least 1 meter is required between two individuals to prevent the spread of infection. For those like me who don’t know metric units, 1 meter is roughly about 3 feet. That is only half the distance that the CDC insists upon.
Initially, Cal/OSHA proposed to hold off on relieving some of the state’s quarantine measures until July 31st, however, Governor Newsom announced last month, in an attempt to gain favor and draw attention away from the recall effort, that he would be reopening the state for regular business and functions by June 15th. Cal/OSHA has stated that it will forego its initial proposal for the governor’s, but the Governor and all the state and municipal departments are sticking to their mid-June reopening date, essentially ignoring the information released by the CDC for the relaxed mask-wearing procedures for fully vaccinated residents.
Because of this confusing and conflicting information, residents have found themselves frustrated and fed up. The U.S. Representative from Kentucky, Thomas Massie, was fined $500 for failing to wear a face mask while on the House floor. He is not the only one. Some of these individuals have cited the CDC’s new information and recommendations for fully vaccinated individuals and feel that Speaker of the House, Pelosi, is just being a control freak.
It is not hard to see that the problem is not that people are being stubborn or inconsiderate, but that there are too many differing reports on what is permissible and necessary. A group of people cannot act in unison if one side is going by what they hear from one leader, while the other side is going off what they hear from another leader. There needs to be a consensus of information and requirements to prevent confusion and unnecessary frustration on behalf of the public.
Photo via Anne Wernikoff
