Ha that’s me. When I leave work, I often leave it on until I get to my car which is about a 4-5 min walk. It’s warm!!! Now in the summer, I will take it off most of the time, but sometimes my hands are full of stuff and it’s easier to leave it on too.
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I walk every morning masked. During the pandemic, I found masking up helps me minimize asthma induced by the cold air.
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I don’t judge or guess why people keep masks on outdoors.
@lilmom the last few weeks have made me think that wearing a mask outdoors alone on my walk or while in my yard might be a good idea. All the pollen flying in the air has me sneezing and with a runny nose.
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Masks were a godsend when I had a bad cold sore. 
I can easily see why a kid with a flair up of acne would want to keep their mask on.
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As long as it doesn’t contribute to “maskne!”
I am in Chicago visiting one of my kids. Not sure if this is an issue specific to the immediate neighborhood or due to lack of vaccination, temperature or other factors but out on the Lakefront Trail today some young children were masked up while their parents were not. I noticed a few examples of this (not a lot of kids were out at that time). I also noticed children w/o masks. The Chicago Park District encourages, but does not require, outdoor masking on its parkland and the city requires indoor masking most everywhere, although they will be removing that mandate this coming Monday, 2/28. Not sure what the new rules will be for park district programs. The kids I saw today looked like they were just out for a stroll with their parents, not involved in organized sports or heading to an indoor activity.
Many parents haven’t had their kids vaccinated even if they are old enough.
My 12 year old grandson often wears his mask even when he doesn’t have to. He’ll wear it in the car when it is just the two of us. I’ve asked him why and he shrugs and says, “Why not.” Hard to argue with that. I think he feels it is just no big deal. I wish adults could realize that too.
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From the mouths of 12 year olds . . . This IMO is what is often missing from the discussion. If you set aside the politics and the posturing, then for most people the actual “cost” of wearing masks is next to nothing, and the benefits are potentially life saving.
[Not talking about small kids, not talking about people with actual medical conditions which actually make masking dangerous.]
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Well, he’s also making sure to wear it around his grandparent who is likely to be in a higher risk category. Perhaps he’s absorbed the common wisdom that young people can asymptomatically infect the older adults in their lives - which of course would be a very big deal. If he’s attending school then he’s in a congregate setting most days of the week and has potentially come close to exposure - or been exposed - numerous times.
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I do not like to take my mask on and off. I usually sanitize my hands before taking my mask off. Around nyc we are still required to wear masks taking public transportation. Indoor masking requirement is going away, but my apartment building still requires it. I do see a lot of people still earring masks outdoor when I am walking on the street.
I went to the 90 yr something birthday. It was an indoor venue with 30 to 40 people. People were masks off, eating and drinking, and standing very close to each other. I had my mask on and didn’t eat or drink. I didn’t stay long because I didn’t want to make people feel uncomfortable, but I didn’t think it was a necessary risk to take.
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I live in a highly mask-adherent area (Boston’s near western suburbs), and it’ll be interesting to see how quickly people, towns and businesses adopt the CDC’s new guidance. I have a feeling I would still be something of a pariah if I were to go into the local Whole Foods without a mask. I went to play tennis at an indoor club in a nearby town (in a county whose CDC transmission level is low), and the club had already removed its wear-a-mask signs. The person sitting at reception wasn’t wearing a mask, and I didn’t either, but almost everyone else who wasn’t actively playing was still masked. Obviously no problem and up to individuals, but I wonder when that will start to change.
I haven’t been a grumbler about masking in general, but I do find it annoying. If I wear one for even a short time outdoors in the cold (hands full of stuff, going in and out of stores or walking to get into an Uber), my glasses fog up — I wear a KN95 that fits well, but I’ve never found a mask without that problem. It’s not a calamity, but a definite peeve. I’ll also be happy to be done with masking at the office, given that our policy is that masks needn’t be worn at one’s desk and so we’re unmasked a lot of the time anyway. (I’m also eager to see the removal of the plexiglass desk barriers that have been in every one of our worldwide offices throughout the pandemic, but that’s a whole other issue.)
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There are going to be unintended consequences for CDC’s relaxation of masking guidelines. if a new variant materializes, it will not work to go back to requiring/recommending masks in most cases.
Case rate is going to be itneresting. In most places, that number is more and more inaccurate, since rapid tests usually don’t require any reporting of results.
There is no concern for long covid. The narrative is that covid is mild (except for certain vulnerable people, who are now on their own). No mention of long covid. But there is still the unanswered question re long covid – who gets it? There is some progress towards answers, but we’re not there yet.
There are treatments! Well, someone I know personally was denied the antiviral because he is vaxxed and boosted. Yet his unvaxxed father got the antiviral, and consequently had a much shorter illness.
Although the CDC’s new guidance clearly mentions appropriate isolation and quarantine protocols, I think since they loosened those requirements a while ago, people aren’t going to take them seriously anymore, either. I already think they aren’t. Contact tracing is on the honor system now in many places. And so are quarantine and isolation considerations. And if someone is positive with mild symptoms, no one will know, and they don’t have to mask.
And regarding concern for the vulnerable? Well, they are on their own. Concern for the children not able to be vaccinated? Not many got their 5-11 year olds vaccinated, and it’s expected that even fewer will get their 6 mos. to 5-year-olds vaccinated, when the vaccine is finally approved for them. So if parents don’t care, why should anyone? Put the entire burden on them to protect their children, just as is being done with the other vulnerable populations.
To be clear, I will continue to mask indoors, not go to indoor restaurants, and avoid crowded places until such time that there is no/very little covid detected in my area’s wastewater. I don’t trust the other metrics. For one thing, my area has plenty of hospital beds, and there were only a few brief times when elective surgeries were cancelled. I’m pretty sure my state is going to stop publicly posting case numbers soon, and my state’s head of public health doesn’t believe in masks. I just hope the covid in sewage trends continue to be posted.
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The Aura mask is the only one I’ve found that keeps my glasses from fogging up. For long periods I find it more comfortable than ones that go around the ears.
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For those worried that you can’t go back on masking that was not the case where I live. I live in a heavily compliant area - despite the fact that masks are currently recommended not mandated I virtually never see anyone inside a public place without one. Last summer, when it briefly looked like this was all over, most of us did drop indoor masking within a couple weeks of the mandate being lifted (maybe 20-30 percent continued in places like grocery stores). Yet people put them back on pretty quickly when omicron hit and we were back to virtually 100% within a week or two, this time without a mandate. I get not everywhere is the same but it worked here.
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I live in a state where there was never any mandates. I was pretty good about wearing a mask during outbreaks, but when Omicron hit, and i got it early January, afterwards, unless required, I removed my mask. I figured I had the “90 days” to enjoy being mask free. Note I was also vaccinated and boosted.
Recently for work I have attended events again. The masks were highly recommended but not required. I would say that 80 percent were not wearing them. I was prepared to still wear them, but I walked into the event and clearly saw the majority was not. So I did not.
In my area, in stores, there are those who are still wearing them, but not the majority.
Next week I visit with my mother in S Florida. She has been living her life throughout the pandemic. Will be interesting to see where she masks.
If a new variant comes along and the cases rise again, I will don a mask more frequently again.
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I think it’s really hard when you live in a climate where you just can’t win. Masks on, complain. Masks off, complain.
I guess I get frustrated when the narrative is whatever the decision, it’s wrong.
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The toughest part about the pandemic in my mind has been the differing risks for complications based on which age group you are in. Through February 16th 2022, a little over 850,000 deaths have been from ages 50 years old or older out of about 914,000 deaths at that time. There have been 822 deaths between newborns and 18 years of age in that same time span, despite being the last groups to get vaccinated, having the lowest vaccination rates, and having a group (0-4) who has yet to get vaccinated. All of the deaths are tragic and we have asked for sacrifices of all groups, but the very young have had to sacrifice more due to having lower risks to have Covid complications. If we were able to look at the numbers of young people who have died of Covid while being fully vaccinated or fully vaccinated and boosted, those risks are almost negligible, but they are asked to follow the same guidelines to protect those with higher risk factors. The problem is that the scientific community believes that Covid is never fully going away. Since my state has not been very big on mandates, we all just have to do what we think is best to protect ourselves and either vaccinate or don’t vaccinate/wear masks or don’t wear masks.
But I believe that mandates will get less and less popular (which means that politicians and especially businesses will be less likely to enact them) as we continue to live with Covid. I know that some worry about the Long Covid risks in all age groups, but recent UK data by age group had ranges between 2.25 and 2.94 percent having long Covid issues (still having an onset of Covid-19 symptoms 12 weeks after testing positive) after hearing possible rates as high as 30% early in the pandemic, which make long Covid much less of an issue long-term.
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I live in central MA. We haven’t had mask mandates here for a long time but mask wearing definitely picked up during the omicron surge to close to 100%. I went shopping this morning for my first venture out since the new cdc guidelines. I would say less than half are wearing masks now. It didn’t take long for people to drop them here. I didn’t wear one and it was so pleasant not to have it on. I have never complained when asked to wear one but have also never been comfortable in them.
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The very young may not want to lose their parents or grandparents.
Studies on long COVID seem to be all over the place, probably at least in part because they use varying definitions of “long COVID”. However, the various studies in the pre-vaccine era suggest that 30% was a much more realistic number than 2-3%.
There was one study which did find that (what it defined as) long COVID was much less likely in breakthrough infections of the vaccinated than in infections of the unvaccinated (of course, the vaccinated were also less likely to get COVID in the first place as well). So it is entirely possible that the 2-3% number is within the ballpark (considering variations in the definition of “long COVID”, etc.) in more recent times if most of the infections were breakthrough infections in the vaccinated.