The San Diego Union Tribune is reporting that Cal/OSHA is moving towards no longer requiring vaccinated workers to mask, even in the presence of an unvaccinated worker. The board proposed the rule change this past week, will meet June 17 to discuss it, and then the new rule could take effect as early as June 28. Is the Union Tribune’s reporting incorrect?
FWIW, in my high school we’ve had two super serious allergy kids over the years. For both, the other kids were very protective of them. I don’t recall a single incident of students lamenting that they can’t eat peanuts or other foods around them. They were the ones making sure new teachers knew about the issue and adjusted accordingly to protect their friends.
This is high school not lower grades so I can’t talk about those, but with my age group I think parents have more issues about “losing their rights” than kids do about “adjusting to help all enjoy life.”
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I’m still mostly dining at home and am rarely dining in outdoor patios of restaurants.
@rickle1, do we know that vaccinated people present very low risk of transmitting COVID or more importantly a variant to others even if they are asymptomatic?
@ucbalumnus, ShawWife has had respiratory issues for a number of years. Depending upon what else she is exposed to, the list of things she his highly allergic to (e.g., can’t breath after being near) is long. So, even though the probabilities for here as a vaccinated person catching COVID are very low (but not zero – 8 vaccinated folks in Maine have died recently of COVID), the potential consequences for ShawWife are quite severe. So we are very careful even in groups.
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I think these things are so tricky now.
I’d like to socialize with people I know who have had the vaccine. Not just because they are vaccinated. But because I know that they think like me, that getting a vaccine is the right thing to do.
I don’t particularly want to socialize with people who think that since they got Covid, now they are good and don’t need to be vaccinated.
It just correlates with my values and beliefs. When they are family members, it’s much more complicated. But I don’t think I would rush to get together with them unless I really had to.
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I understand. My SIL isn’t going to get vaccinated, and she wants to see my now-5-month old GD. Fortunately, because she lives pretty far away, it’s not an issue right now. But there is talk about her bringing my MIL to visit. D doesn’t want SIL to hold her baby, and she doesn’t want the baby indoors with SIL. We aren’t going to make waves if she doesn’t come. If she does come, though, we’ll have to give her the rules of the visit. To be honest, I am hoping she doesn’t come. I really wish she would just get vaccinated, but it’s not going to happen … and she doesn’t take any precautions.
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@kelsmom do you think she would have any change of heart if she knew ahead of time she has to be vaccinated to hold the baby? To find out the rules when she gets in town might really create some angst?
H will talk to her in advance, as soon as he is sure she will be coming. We don’t think it will change her mind, but at least she will know in advance & not be blindsided. She has a very different outlook on many things than we have, and we try hard not to let it drive a wedge between us.
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We went out for Taco Tuesday and the place was packed - took 45 minutes to get our food, way longer than ever before. But even though California “opened up” today, the servers were all masked as were many patrons coming and going, as well as several people on the sidewalks. Also all the help and most customers in CVS were masked.
Then we took the scenic route home along the ocean and stopped to let a wedding party cross the road to get to the cliffs on the other side for pictures. The groomsmen were all in Marine Corps dress blues, the groom and fathers were in tuxes, the bridesmaids were in pale blue gowns, and the bride was in a lovely white gown. Finest wedding party we’ve seen on the cliffs - I would have taken a picture as they walked in front of our car but thought it would be rude. Oh - they weren’t masked ;).
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Restaurant servers and other workers are still masking because they are subject to the rules of Cal/OSHA. The state employment regulator has done some flip flopping on the issue, but I believe the latest is that they plan to meet tomorrow to issue new guidance that will allow vaccinated workers to go unmasked if they wish to, and then the governor plans to issue an emergency order putting the rule into effect immediately (without an executive order it would take another couple of weeks for the new guidance to be implemented).
I too saw many customers continuing to mask yesterday. At Panera, they still had the “mask required” sign on the door, and I wasn’t sure if that was a company policy or if they just hadn’t gotten around to changing it; all patrons masked unless seated at a table. At CVS, the signage was unclear, but I wore a mask because I had heard pharmacies count as health care facilities. At another restaurant, I overheard a diner ask his waiter why folks were being allowed to walk around inside the restaurant without masks! So, clearly, what was an eagerly anticipated day for some passed without notice for others!
I went to both my Ralph’s and Trader Joe’s yesterday in La Jolla and I did not see one customer (or workers of course) without a mask. I think it is going to take people awhile here to give up masks inside.
In my area around UCSD I still see many people walking with masks on. H and I have not worn our masks outside for months since we are fully vaccinated. If we are walking by someone who is wearing a mask we still give them plenty of room.
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I’m currently vacationing in Ocean City, MD. The town is operating almost entirely as it did before Covid. The vast majority of people are not wearing masks in any venue. There have been less than 5% of people wearing masks in different areas. It seems that most people feel safe doing this now. Our governor lifted the mask mandate for everyone four and a half weeks ago. Maryland’s covid numbers have plummeted. We had just 78 new cases yesterday (about 1/100,000) with a test positivity rate of 0.78%. Our hospitalizations have fallen to their lowest level with just 167 people in the hospital with covid. The governor also is lifting our state of emergency on July 1. I have eaten inside restaurants, gone on large, populated fishing trips, went to a sundae party/music festival and drone show and went swimming at a local pool while here. I have not had to or felt the need to mask at any time. It’s nice to be fully vaccinated.
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We just returned from our local (indoor) market and eating lunch at the food court. Not one single mask in sight. New places are opening up inside of it too - more than Pre-Covid. It’s definitely the place to go around us for all sorts of food types. Many businesses have groups taking their lunch breaks there since X can get BBQ while Y gets Mexican and Z gets Korean, etc.
I sure hope this is the end of Covid and not just a lull between variants.
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B.1.1.7 has been dominant in the US over the past few months, but it appears to be getting displaced by B.1.617.2. Vaccines are still effective against the latter, but perhaps somewhat less effective, so the relative effectiveness of vaccines against different variants may be selecting for those which vaccines are less effective against.
However, the range of mutation is limited. There are plenty of ways for the spike protein to mutate to make vaccines against the “classic” virus ineffective, but most of those also reduce the spike protein’s ability to attach to human ACE2 receptors, making the virus ineffective at infection. The main concern is if the virus finds a mutation that both evades vaccine-derived immunity (and probably also immunity from previous natural infection with “classic” virus) and is still effective at infection.
Moderna has been trialing a version of vaccine targeting B.1.351 and finding it more effective against that variant, so making vaccines against variants is certainly possible. But it may be a game of catch-up.
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Shows how effective the vaccines truly are. MD has a very high vax rate relative to other states. No mask mandate for 4.5 weeks. Most going unmasked. You would think there would be an increase in cases but cases and hospitalizations are plummeting. Despite what some people believe, THAT"S GREAT NEWS!!
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I am in San Diego visiting my son. The last two days I went to Starbucks there was a sign saying masks not required for vaccinated people. I didn’t wear a mask but a lot of people still had them on. We walked around the local outdoor mall and we saw a lot less masks than my last visit a few weeks ago. I live an hour away in Orange County where compliance has always been less.
My state’s mask mandate ended around Mother’s Day for those who were fully vaccinated, but business restrictions remained in place until last Friday. I continued to wear my mask until early June as a precaution since I didn’t want to get sick prior to my flight to FL to meet 7 month old granddaughter there. Knew I wouldn’t be seriously ill, but still was trying to prevent mild illness. While I feel safe fully vaccinated, the local news stats tonight confirmed why I had been cautious. In our 4 state area, largest county vaccination rate is 42% in a county in my state about 45 minutes from where I live. Lowest vaccination rate is in neighboring county on the other side of mine - 21%. Just to the north, one county only has 14% vaccinated and the county in that state with highest rate in our viewing area has 25%. I just don’t understand why people are declining the vaccine. Frustrating…
There was a study I saw summarized that showed that there was a fairly strong negative correlation between a state’s (or a county’s) vaccination rate and its infection rates.
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Probably many people have a collection of masks…
Would it be reasonable to use them as follows after full vaccination?
- Ordinary mask-required or mask-polite situations: cloth masks (which are washable and reusable).
- Mask-required or mask-polite situations where cloth masks may cause interference (e.g. while exercising where cloth masks get annoying when sweating): surgical-mask-material masks.
- Higher risk (including for contagions other than SARS-CoV-2) situations like many health care facilities: N95 (with or without outlet valve), KN95, KF94, etc…
Of course, medically vulnerable people (e.g. those who get weak immunity from vaccination, or who have pre-existing lung issues which make getting COVID-19 particularly dangerous for them) may have a larger set of situations which are “higher risk” than most people (and hence may need a larger supply of the N95, KN95, KF94, etc. masks).
Seriously? That mask regimen you just described for fully vaccinated people is more than I did before I was vaccinated. I have never owned an N95 or similar mask. Now that I am vaccinated, I haven’t put on a mask in a couple weeks and I don’t intend to unless absolutely required to. I do have a couple doctors appointments coming up so I will wear a paper mask for those since that’s what doctors offices seem to prefer. I will be flying for vacation later this summer so will wear my cloth mask, which I prefer, if they are still required at that point. Other than that I don’t anticipate wearing a mask at all anymore at all.
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