WASHINGTON — Ahead of President Joe Biden’s speech on the newest coronavirus guidelines, the White House celebrated the new guidelines lifting mask requirements for people fully vaccinated.
Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and a group of senators took their masks off during an Oval Office meeting as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Thursday that people who are fully vaccinated against Covid-19 no longer need to wear masks or physically distance themselves, indoors or outdoors in most circumstances.
First Lady Jill Biden, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and actress Jennifer Garner took their masks off during a trip to a high school in West Virginia following the announcement.
White House staffers were also sent an email announcing that effective immediately, anyone working on the campus who is fully vaccinated is no longer required to wear a mask on the White House complex.
White House aides were seen Thursday working in the building without a mask for the first time since Biden took office.
The White House Correspondents Association sent an email to members on Thursday saying that effective immediately, the mask-wearing requirements for reporters on the White House grounds were lifted for those fully vaccinated.
Thursday’s announcement is a major milestone for Biden, who entered office at the height of the pandemic when more than 3,000 were dying each day in the United States. He repeatedly pleaded with Americans to wear a mask, and unlike his predecessor routinely wore one when not speaking behind a podium.
The change comes more than a year after the public was told to start wearing a mask, a move that became viewed as much a political statement as a health precaution by many Americans.
Under the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s new guidance announced Thursday, people who are fully vaccinated — meaning, two weeks removed from their second shot — no longer need to wear masks or physically distance themselves, indoors or outdoors in most circumstances.
“If you are fully vaccinated, you can start doing the things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic,” CDC director Rochelle Walensky said. “We have all longed for this moment where we can get back to some sense of normalcy.”
Walensky said the CDC was making the move now because of a significant drop in cases, widespread availability of the vaccine and real-world data showing the vaccine’s effectiveness.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
