Get the latest BPR news delivered free to your inbox daily. SIGN UP HERE
In the wake of the latest variant of Covid-19, several universities in the country are reinstating mask mandates, citing a “significant increase” of coronavirus cases on campuses.
Among the more notable institutions that have reinstated the mandates are Georgetown University, Rice University, Columbia University, Johns Hopkins University, and American university.
An announcement back on April 6th of the return of the mask policy by Georgetown University summarizes much of the thinking behind most of the other establishments as well, saying that the uptick in Covid-19 cases has forced them to reinstate a mask mandate while indoors on university property:
“We are taking these steps in response to a significant increase in COVID-19 cases on the Main Campus and Medical Center campuses this week, particularly among undergraduate students. This increase is partly due to the impact of the BA.2 omicron subvariant. BA.2 is now the dominant strain in the United States, including in DC and on our campuses. While recent studies show that BA.2 does not cause more severe illness than the initial omicron variant, they also show that BA.2 is even more transmissible.”
Similarly, on April 10th Columbia University also announced that it was reinstating its mask policy, citing the “current situation” and “an abundance of caution.”
“We remain in low-risk or green status based on Columbia’s COVID-19 monitoring plan and so does New York City based on its designated risk levels. Over the past few weeks there has been an uptick in the number of COVID-19 cases in New York City and not surprisingly in the percent positivity in our own surveillance testing program,” the school announced.
According to Georgetown’s online dashboard, 98 percent of the faculty and students alike are vaccinated against Covid-19. However, with the increase in cases, largely blamed on the new BA.2 subvariant of the Omicron variant of Covid-19, some are calling for a return to mask mandates.
However, not everyone is convinced that re-masking will actually accomplish anything. Dr. Marc Siegel, a professor of medicine at New York University Langone Medical Center, and commentator for Fox News gave his take on the return of the mask policy, stating bluntly “the time for mask mandates is gone” when asked.
“So as an overall philosophy, I’m against mask mandates right now. The time for mask mandates is gone,” Siegel told Fox News Digital.
Siegel went on to say that a mask mandate would be acceptable in certain situations, such as a large increase in cases of Covid-19 on campus. The professor also stated that such an outbreak on campus is unlikely, given the very high vaccination rate of the vast majority of colleges and universities.
Another reason why Siegel wasn’t too concerned was that the group in question, college students, are overwhelmingly in the young and healthy category most likely to resist Covid-19, just as they are less at risk for things like heart disease or diabetes than older members of society.
“The fact that that age group is not at much risk for severe disease, that makes me want to have almost no mandates. Mandates should be reserved for high volume situation for risky disease that we’re moving away from that,” Siegel noted
Regardless of risk, or lack thereof, many universities are choosing to act on an “abundance of caution,” as Columbia University stated.
DONATE TO BIZPAC REVIEW
Please help us! If you are fed up with letting radical big tech execs, phony fact-checkers, tyrannical liberals and a lying mainstream media have unprecedented power over your news please consider making a donation to BPR to help us fight them. Now is the time. Truth has never been more critical!
- Patriotic symbols, loved one’s urn miraculous survive house fire, give California family hope - May 17, 2022
- Elon Musk says Twitter deal ‘cannot move forward’ until CEO proves his claim of low bot rate - May 17, 2022
- Poll shows 1 in 4 men believe women should face murder charge if they get illegal abortion - May 15, 2022
Comment
We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.
BPR INSIDER COMMENTS
Scroll down for non-member comments or join our insider conversations by becoming a member. We'd love to have you!
8 thoughts on “Top US colleges reinstate mask requirements amid calls for mask mandates to be ‘gone’”
Comments are closed.
Notice the people who get the variance covid are actually the vaxxed. A study shown that this covid vaccine actually lower your natural immune system, that’s why the booster. The irony is the more booster you get the more suppressed the immune system. That’s why that Jen Pissky got it twice, too bad, it’s just a flu.
What ignorance!!! Mask doesn’t work, it’s more about control. I would give them the double middle finger!!!
Sure glad our universities are on the leading edge of stupidity. Otherwise one would wonder why so many of their graduates are idiots.
There is ZERO science to back an of this nonsense. I will go one step beyond Dr Siegel and say to require masks on ANY college campus is the height of ignorance. All the reasons he quoted (age, vaccination status, medical condition, etc.) are all true and good reasons NOT to mask, but there is one huge one that NOBODY seems to want to talk about.
Despite the increase in case numbers, hospitalizations and death CONTINUE to decline!
If you recall, the reason for all the stupid mandates was to prevent overwhelming the hospitals. If hospitalizations and deaths are DECLINING, then why do we need ANY mandates? The short answer is – we DON’T.
If the Left thinks this will do anything to increase their chances in November, they can continue to spit into the wind. This horse hockey will make people even angrier than they already are and people are not willing to do the mail-in thing again because they know it causes fraud. Insane people think doing the same thing will produce different results.
Another reason to not go to the liberal bastions. Stupidity.
The irony, of course, is that the efficacy of masks never even existed.
Simple fact: wear the mask, still get the virus. Cling to your denial if you must, but that’s NOT going to change.
I’m willing to bet these new calls for mask mandates are more about the upcoming election than the virus. Democrats are acutely aware that mail in ballots were the key to successfully cheating last time, and without the virus to keep the fear stoked, mail in ballots are unnecessary. The closer we get to November, the more the virus will be making frightening headlines.
Good one. Get the Jab, get the covid.
Even colleges can act stupidly. Especially eastern ones. The science doesn’t back them up, and I can remember all of them saying to “Follow the science!” IMO, covid has been used to control the populace, with Fauci doing the dictating. It was also used to throw an election, IMO, with laws being changed by people who had no authority to do so, and Zuckerberg doing his share of buying drop boxes, donating money, and even lately we’ve learned he had his own people installed in the counting process. The last election deserves a do-over, not an impeachment, but a complete do-over!. IMO, it was the most corrupt election, ever.