A breath of fresh air?

“Per the CDC, in most circumstances, fully vaccinated individuals are no longer required to wear a mask in either indoor or outdoor settings.”

— from the Office of the Governor, Michelle Lujan Grisham

May 14, 2021

It’s arrived. The day we’ve all looked forward to for the last year: no more masks. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) announced last week that fully-vaccinated people are permitted to stop wearing masks in nearly all settings. (Unvaccinated or partially-vaccinated people are still required to wear masks.)

Soon we will be having breakfast in a packed Michael’s Kitchen, strolling through the Plaza on a warm summer evening, or seeing a show at Kit Carson Park, and we may be doing so without the doom represented by masked crowds.

We are already starting to see masks disappear as some businesses take down their COVIDrelated warning signs and mask requirements become more a matter of personal choice than government mandate.

We can all breathe again. But can we breathe easy?

A short time after the CDC announcement, National Nurses United, the nation’s largest nurses union, spoke out against the new guidelines.

“You can’t look at somebody and say, ‘You’re not vaccinated so you need to put on a mask,’” National Nurses United President, Deborah Berger told CBS.

The previous messaging from the CDC was that people need to wear masks until enough folks are vaccinated to reach herd immunity. That means roughly 85 percent of the nation needs to be vaccinated. The national number currently sits around 30 percent (though New Mexico is well over 50 percent.) Now, the CDC has reversed course. Such a quick switch in position can cause trepidation. And mixed messaging from authority has hounded the U.S. response to COVID from the beginning.

So, where do we turn for guidance?

The answer may lie in those people eating next to you at Michael’s Kitchen, the dancer next to you at the Kit Carson Park concert, the crowds at the Plaza. Listen to yourself and your community. The lifting of mask mandate puts power in individuals’ hands.

The Town of Taos announced a mask mandate on July 1, 2020. Since then, it has been a source of contention in the community. But the Town of Taos maintained order and kept restrictions in place that saw to the welfare of Taoseños, even when those restrictions were unpopular. Because local governments and local people have a good understanding of the needs of their community, they are often in the best position to assess the needs of people in their jurisdiction.

So, listen to the experts. When they agree, it’s simpler. Like in the case of the COVID vaccine. Experts agree that everyone who can get the shot, should.

But when the experts don’t agree, listen to your community and your family and yourself. If you are uncomfortable browsing through the Plaza without a face covering, wear a mask. If not, then don’t.

Removal of the mask mandate may help businesses by encouraging people to go out. It may boost community morale. Or it may backfire and prove to be a huge mistake. Like so many things in this pandemic, we just don’t know yet.

Now, we have a simple choice: wear the mask or get the shot.