New York Daily News

Jersey to lift school mask rule in March

- BY KATE FELDMAN

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy announced Monday he’ll lift the state mask mandate for schools March 7, though local districts will still have the authority to keep their own orders in place.

The Democrat called the planned move “a huge step back to normalcy for our kids.”

“We’re not going to manage COVID to zero,” he said. “We have to learn how to live with COVID as we move from a pandemic to the endemic stage of this virus. To be sure, we’ve known this for a long time, and we are optimistic that given the decreased severity of this new variant and the continued increase in vaccinatio­ns that we are finally nearing this inflection point.”

New Jersey has maintained some of the strictest COVID-19 protocols in the country and was one of just 11 states to order that students wear masks. Individual districts will have the next month to determine if they want to leave the mandate or any protocols in place.

Murphy praised the “overwhelmi­ng majority” of students who followed the mandates, saying they “truly represent our highest New Jersey values of selflessne­ss, community spirit, collective responsibi­lity and looking out for others.” About one in four New Jersey children are fully vaccinated and one in three have received at least one shot as of Feb. 1, according to NJ.com.

Murphy last renewed his mask mandate Jan. 11, hours before his executive order expired. Last school year, he announced plans to leave the decision up to individual districts, but instead issued a statewide order as the omicron variant sparked a surge of cases in the fall.

At the press conference, Murphy also defended maintainin­g stricter protocols in the state for the better part of two years and avoiding the “roller coaster” in states that lifted and then reinstated rules.

COVID hospitaliz­ations and deaths in New Jersey have continued to plummet in recent weeks. The state currently requires masks in “high-risk areas” like schools, hospitals, public transit, child care centers, correction­al facilities and homeless shelters.

As of mid-January, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was still recommendi­ng universal indoor masking for all students, staff, teachers and visitors, regardless of vaccinatio­n status.

Murphy was narrowly reelected to the governor’s mansion in November in a race that pundits viewed as a referendum on mask mandates and other COVID protocols.

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