NC is still mandating face masks in schools as it lifts most requirements elsewhere

Updated Friday with state announcing that masks will still be required at schools.

North Carolina health officials say it’s too soon to know when they’ll drop the indoor face mask requirement in the state’s public and private schools.

On Friday, Gov. Roy Cooper announced that he’s lifting most of the state’’s face mask and social distancing requirements. But face masks are still required at schools, officials said, because most children have not yet been vaccinated for COVID-19.

The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services recently ended the requirement that face coverings be worn outdoors at schools. But state Health Director Dr. Betsey Tilson said Thursday that it could be awhile, especially at elementary schools, before the indoor face mask requirement is lifted.

Thursday was the first day that children ages 12 to 15 were eligible to get the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine.

“Although it’s great news that our 12 and up are eligible for a vaccine, there’s obviously a lot of people under age 12 that are in our school setting, so we’re still going to be for a while predominantly unvaccinated students. And we see that strength of that mask mandate,” Tilson said at Thursday’s State Board of Education meeting.

“So I think we’re going to have to keep ... thinking through ... that balance of protection you get from immunization vs. masks.”

The state change in non-school settings comes aftee new recommendations Thursday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention saying people who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 “can participate in indoor and outdoor activities, large or small, without wearing a mask or physical distancing.”

But schools are a sticking point because COVID-19 vaccines aren’t available yet for all students. Some parents have lobbied school leaders, including State Superintendent Catherine Truitt, for the mask mandate to be lifted.

“What conditions need to be present in order for the masking order to be lifted in our schools?” Truitt asked DHHS leaders on Thursday. “Will it be different for elementary schools than 6 to 12, or do those conditions need to be the same for the entire K-12 population?”

Tilson answered that the pandemic is unprecedented so it’s hard to say what specific metrics would be used for lifting the school mask mandate. But she said “masks in schools are going to be really a good idea for a long time.”

Masks credited for reducing COVID in schools

Tilson pointed Thursday to data presented by the ABC Science Collaborative that credits face mask use for the low rate of COVID-19 transmissions in the state’s public schools. The ABC Science Collaborative is a partnership of Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill that advises schools on how to deal with the pandemic.

“Schools are a low-risk environment if there is high fidelity of masking,” Dr. Danny Benjamin, co-chairman of the ABC Science Collaborative, said Thursday. “It’s high risk of transmission if we’re not masked.”

Benjamin called the face mask mandate “a crucial part” of the state’s school COVID plan. In contrast, he pointed to states such as Florida that he said have a high risk of COVID-19 transmission in schools because masks are not required.

In March, the North Carolina General Assembly passed a law requiring school districts to offer daily in-person instruction at elementary schools. For middle schools and high schools, districts were required to offer full-time daily in-person classes, called Plan A, or a mix of in-person and online classes, called Plan B.

Schools in Plan B are required to have 6 feet of distancing between students. Distancing isn’t required in Plan A.

Districts such as Wake County, Johnston County and Charlotte-Mecklenburg moved middle and high schools to Plan A. But other districts, such as Durham and Orange counties and Chapel Hill-Carrboro, are using Plan B for those grades.

Districts that used Plan A in middle and high schools had to report their COVID data to the ABC Collaborative. Preliminary data shows that Plan A schools that follow state health guidelines and the mask mandate “effectively mitigate within school transmission of COVID-19,” according to Benjamin.

Benjamin said there is no greater transmission of COVID-19 in Plan A than Plan B.

“There’s no medical safety reason to support Plan B compared to Plan A provided that the LEAs (local education agencies) adhere to the mask mandate,” Benjamin said.