COVID-19 is still circulating in the U.S. and Arizona, but one of the last holdout rules for preventing the virus may soon go away: face mask requirements on public transportation, including planes.
Several international airlines and airports are ending face mask requirements and major U.S. airlines are pushing to do the same.
Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich has joined forces with attorneys general in at least 20 other mostly Republican-led states in a lawsuit seeking to overturn the federal face mask requirement for transportation. In a written statement, Brnovich called it a “ridiculously burdensome policy.”
It’s not solely business and political interests seeking to ease face mask rules on planes and other modes of transportation. Public health experts say the face mask mandate can’t exist in perpetuity and some say it’s time to consider relaxing the rules.
“Vaccines clearly are preventing severe disease among the vast majority of people that have been vaccinated,” said Dr. Joshua LaBaer, executive director of Arizona State University’s Biodesign Institute. “I don’t think as a society we’re at that much risk anymore.”
Writing in the Washington Post on April 6, Joseph Allen, a professor at Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health, said the science supports relaxing face mask rules during flights, provided other measures are in place to protect passengers.
“Even at the beginning of the pandemic, the science was clear that although transmission can happen on an airplane, it’s very rare. The scientific evidence accumulated since the start of the pandemic confirms this,” he wrote.
The Transportation and Safety Administration’s mask requirements on public transportation and in transportation hubs had been set to expire March 18. But at the recommendation of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the directive was extended for one month to April 18.
“At some point, the restriction has to be lifted,” said Dr. David…