The state health department will allow the mask mandate for health care settings, including medical facilities and nursing homes, to lapse on Feb. 12.
“The pandemic is not over, yet we are moving to a transition,” said Dr. James McDonald, the state’s acting health commissioner, in a statement on Friday. “As we do, and with safe and effective vaccines, treatments, and more, we are able to lift the state's masking requirement in health care settings as operators now develop and implement their own facility-specific plans, in accordance with federal CDC guidance and the level of transmission in their areas."
According to the department, the policy change is intended to align the state’s guidance with the latest federal recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which call on health facilities to determine their masking rules based on transmission levels. When COVID-19 transmission rates reach a high enough threshold, as determined by the CDC, facilities are then expected to implement mask requirements. In its announcement, the state health department said higher levels of transmission could bring about the return of mask mandates, if the CDC were to recommend them.
The new measures cover hospitals, nursing homes, home health care and hospice agencies, and diagnostic and treatment centers, but do not apply to all medical centers. Private medical and dental practices are among the health care settings outside of the health department’s regulatory jurisdiction, but the department strongly advised them to also adhere to these measures.
The department maintains that masking is an effective form of protection from infection. State health officials continue to recommend up-to-date COVID-19 vaccinations for everyone older than six months.
The city ended its COVID-19 vaccine mandate for public-sector workers on Friday, the same day as the state’s announcement. Both mandates ended just shy of the third anniversary of the detection of the first COVID-19 case in New York state on March 1.
