Interesting how this aligns with the red/blue 2020 electoral map...very interesting indeed.
Blue cities have turned green and red America stays orange.
Posted on 02/25/2022 4:03:44 PM PST by lightman
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Feb. 25 drastically changed a key measure that is used by officials across the country to determine whether or not to require mask-wearing.
The federal agency now says nearly three-quarters of Americans don’t need to wear masks because they live in areas with low or medium community risk from COVID-19.
The dramatic switch comes because the CDC switched from only using COVID-19 cases as a factor and are taking into account other metrics, including hospitalizations.
“This updated approach focuses on directing our prevention efforts toward protecting people at high risk for severe ailments and preventing hospitals and healthcare systems from being overwhelmed,” Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the CDC’s director, told reporters on a call.
Walensky said the CDC “came up with indicators, including new hospital admissions and hospital beds utilized” and combined “them with case incidents to really create a packet of metrics to be able to understand what’s happening at the local level.”
The CDC will count all hospitalizations, regardless of whether the patients were admitted because of COVID-19 or tested positive for COVID-19 after being admitted for another reason.
The previous measures for transmission, unchanged since March 2020 before Friday, counted a county as having substantial risk of COVID-19 transmission if there were as few as 50 new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people in the past 7 days, or the percentage of positive tests was at least 8 percent in the same timeframe.
High transmission risk meant a county had 100 or more new cases per 100,000 people or 10 percent or higher positive tests in the past 7 days.
Under the scheme, over 95 percent of the country on Feb. 25 was labeled substantial or high risk, even though COVID-19 cases have plunged in recent weeks and just 77,458 cases were recorded nationwide on Feb. 23.
After the update, the substantial risk column was removed. Now, just 37 percent of U.S. counties are deemed at high risk.
People who live in those counties, representing 28.2 percent of the U.S. population, are advised to wear a mask in public indoor settings such as schools.
In the rest of the counties, people are not advised to wear masks unless they test positive for COVID-19 or have been exposed to somebody with COVID-19.
People can still wear masks if they feel more comfortable, Walensky said.
The CDC had resisted calls to alter its community risk metric for months, even after many of the governors who had kept masking requirements in place announced in early February those requirements would be eased or withdrawn.
Walensky signaled a change might be coming in a recent briefing, acknowledging the sharp drop in cases and hospitalizations. But she’s also indicated that people would be urged to mask up in the future if the CDC thinks it’s necessary.
“We want to give people a break from things like mask-wearing, when these metrics are better, and then have the ability to reach for them again should things worsen,” she said.
Jeffrey Zients, a White House official, did not deny the White House had been in touch with the CDC on revising its masking recommendations but said the CDC was “in the lead here on both the substance and the timing of masking guidance.”
Federal health officials say masks are effective at preventing COVID-19 transmission, pointing primarily to studies the CDC has published in its quasi-journal. One such paper, published Feb. 4, relied on self-reporting and found no statistically significant benefit for wearing cloth masks. Critics say the studies don’t support mask-wearing, especially wearing cloth masks.
the CDC should stop using the 8 ball fortune teller
Interesting how this aligns with the red/blue 2020 electoral map...very interesting indeed.
Blue cities have turned green and red America stays orange.
“’This updated approach focuses on directing our prevention efforts toward protecting people at high risk for severe ailments and preventing hospitals and healthcare systems from being overwhelmed...’”
Oh, Fer Pete’s SAKE! THIS! THIS is what you jerks SHOULD have done in the FIRST place!
Aarrgghh!
But - nobody ever asks me how to run the country...
Just in time for SOTU
Just in time for SOTU
I think Nancy will nod her head off agreeing with Biden
Flip a coin?
Moving the goalposts. Again. It is the way “science is done”. LOL
LM Covid-Free AO
“Interesting how this aligns with the red/blue 2020 electoral map...very interesting indeed.”
Winner!
CDC can only issue guidelines, right? Or because Biden declared a state of emergency they can impose their will for whatever reason?
Better pre truck blockade, than post truck blockade.
Besides, Blue states are setting up COVID Passports as fast
as they can.
They aren’t done with control yet.
Moving the goal post is correct. Just like the benchmark for a baby learning at least 50 words used to be by 24 months. Now it’s by 30 months. So the government can say Covid did not affect babies development…..just as many are reaching the benchmark. It is sickening.
The CDC is essentially dead...no credibility at all...none...nada. They more than blew it, they manipulated it...all of it, for political gain.
They no longer get any respect or attention...they’re nothing but a pack of feral liars.
They can close up shop and never be heard from again...ever. We’d all be better for it.
The average pore size of a mask is 10,000 nm. The size of the virus is 100 nm. (Think of shoveling sand with a tennis racket)
I was taught 40 years ago masks don’t stop viruses.
They claim saying the election was stolen was “The Big Lie”.
This Covid scamdemic was “The Big Lie on STEROIDS”.
Fauxi said in the beginning of this mess that masks don’t work and this is just a bad flu. That’s the last time he told the truth.
All based on science fiction....you can still catch it on an airplane, but...not in a restaurant. 🙄
the CDC changed the “science” AGAIN ...
I would LOVE to see McCarthy stand and rip the speech in half, just so I could watch the media heads explode with their hair on fire!! McCarthy doesn’t have the balls!!
DITTO my feelings exactly CDC, NIH and every other alphabet agency in government ALL untrustworthy LYING SCUM!!!
New York lifts mask mandate for schools
In "early March".
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