No More Masks
How safe are the University of Michigan’s newest mask guidelines?
—By Marina Khreizat and Neha Gogineni
As the Covid-19 pandemic has evolved over the past two years, restrictions have been increasingly strict following fluctuations. Every cough or sneeze was treated with a small amount of panic, unsure if it meant the season was changing or 10 days of isolation. However, as the case count and hospitalization rate continue to fall after the Omicron surge in January 2022, restrictions and policies surrounding Covid have become increasingly lenient—pointing to a slowing of the virus’s spread and a hopeful return to normalcy.
Institutions and universities have begun changing their policies to reflect this hopeful return to normal life, including the University of Michigan. On March 9th, 2022, Dr. Robert Ernst, Associate Vice President of Student Life, and Dr. Preeti Malani, U-M Chief Health Officer, announced that the University of Michigan would be dropping the mask mandate for most indoor spaces effective March 14th. Under the new mandate, offices, residence halls, sporting events, and most other non-classroom spaces would not require masking, although masks would still be required in classrooms. The announcement came after nearly two years of strict masking requirements and a general consensus that masking was the new norm. So what caused the abrupt mid-semester change and was it the right decision?
Why did the new policy go into effect?
On March 11th, 2020, the University of Michigan canceled classes in response to new Covid-19 concerns. Since then, the university had ongoing changes in policies ranging from masking, travel, vaccination status, and more—along with an ongoing debate about these policies. So, when is the right time to remove mask mandates in a pandemic? Well, the university has decided that a mid-semester change to the mask policy was warranted and subsequently removed the mandate for offices, residence halls, and athletic events. According to the email sent by the university, Ernst and Malani cited high vaccination rates on campus and declining Covid-19 cases as the reason for the switch. In the last week of February, the university reported 53 preliminary positive cases – down from a high of 1,933 during the omicron surge in early January. As of April 3rd, 2022, 98% of students have completed their primary Covid-19 vaccination series, and 90% have also received their booster shot. The vaccination mandate amongst students will, however, remain in effect.
Too early or too late? What other schools are doing
The University of Michigan’s indoor mask guideline followed other Big 10 Universities with announcements to phase out indoor masks. For example, Michigan State University removed their indoor mask mandate on March 6, one week before the University of Michigan’s guidelines. Another Big 10 school, Ohio State University, made masks optional indoors effective March 11.
In addition to Big 10 Universities, various colleges in Michigan removed their indoor mask requirements around the same time that the University of Michigan did—Wayne State on March 11, Central Michigan on March 18, and Oakland University on March 24. Additionally, the Washtenaw County Health Department lifted indoor masking for K-12 schools beginning February 28. However, some school districts in Washtenaw County, such as Ann Arbor Public Schools, decided to keep their mask mandates in place, stating that the health and safety of their students is their number-one priority at this time.
What does the research say?
With a lack of consistent mask requirements in the Ann Arbor community, it is challenging to assess whether an optional mask requirement is actually a safe policy. Dr. Ernst recently sent an update to the University of Michigan community on March 30th stating that the number of Covid case counts are increasing both on campus and in the wider community. A majority of these case counts are attributable to unmasked social gatherings.
However, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states that 70% of people in the United States are at low or medium risk for Covid. On February 25, 2022, the CDC removed indoor masking requirements. At this stage of the pandemic, the CDC is no longer concerned about absolute case numbers, but rather preventing serious illness and hospitalization. As the leading national public health agency of the United States, the CDC relies less on new Covid cases as an important measure, but rather utilizes the number of hospitalizations and hospital capacity to detect severe illnesses. These new metrics, according to the CDC, are more representative of the strain on the healthcare system.
Dr. Karvonen-Gutierrez, an Assistant Professor of Epidemiology in the School of Public Health at the University of Michigan, says that for public health planning, metrics such as the number of hospitalizations and hospital capacity are sufficient. “The reality of where we are in this pandemic right now is that a good portion of the population, and it varies by geography and age, is either vaccinated, has already been infected, or both. In that way, counting a case of Covid as a metric of the activity of the pandemic is probably not the most relevant metric right now because for the vast majority of those people, they are not going to need any resources or infrastructure, and may not even be contributing to community spread,” Dr. Karvonen-Gutierrez said.
In addition to using new metrics to measure Covid spread, the CDC created a Covid-19 Community Levels map in order to help county’s determine their risk for Covid. According to this map, Southeast Michigan is at low risk for Covid, meaning that individuals can decide whether or not they should wear a mask based on their own individual risk.
A cautious optimism among students and faculty
According to The Michigan Daily’s article “Campus Reacts to News of Updated COVID-19 Mask Mandate” by Sejal Patil, there seem to be mixed feelings about the new mask mandate ranging from apprehension to relief that the mandate was lifted. This was generally consistent with the information we gathered from a variety of University of Michigan students as well.
Anjali Vaishnav, a first-year medical student, said she was “originally caught off guard” by the new mandate because she “didn’t think it would happen so soon.” Upon looking later, she says, “it seems to be in line with the declining case count and what other institutions are doing in the area.” As mentioned, for example, Ohio State University and Michigan State University have also recently made indoor masking optional in many cases, with the exception of instructional spaces.
For Avani Samandur, a senior undergraduate student at the School of Public Health, the news of a mask revision policy was exciting because it usually means “Covid cases are going down” and she is “excited for life to safely get back to pre-Covid norms.” That being said, she acknowledges that she is fortunate to be vaccinated and not immunocompromised, unlike some of her peers, so it is important to “stay diligent with the existing policies.”
Amongst the students we spoke to, many of them also pointed out the inherent confusion about why masking was still required in some areas when it is no longer required in others. Tanvi Jaikamal, an undergraduate LSA senior studying Computer Science at the University of Michigan, said she found herself initially “wondering how classroom settings are different from the settings where masks are no longer required.”
Similarly, Noelle Gorka, a senior at the School of Public Policy, says, “If there is enough concern that we’re still requiring (masks) for classrooms, why would that be different for other school buildings?” Does the hallway outside the classroom and the classroom itself have that much of a difference in transmissibility?
Another issue raised by students is that the masking policies were not properly followed in the first place, so there may not be much of a change in how masking happens in non-classroom areas. Layla Jawad, a senior studying Business at the Ross School of Business, says that the Winter Garden, an open study area at Ross, was “filled to capacity and students were mask-less because of eating or pulling down masks to speak or not wearing masks at all.” Before this new revision, “many students just did not follow the mask mandate,” she says. So will this new policy really change much amongst the students?
The same sentiment was also shared by a Resident Advisor (RA) at Couzens Hall, who wished to remain anonymous: “For the most part, students were not following the policy in the first place.… Some students were wearing it in common areas, but that is about it, so nothing changed from before and after the policy went into effect.” The RA mentioned that because of this, their fear of contracting Covid has not really changed.
While Jawad’s and the RA’s experience in the Ross School of Business and residence halls have pointed to poor mask-policy abidance before the policy, Samandur’s, Gorka’s, and Vaishnav’s experiences in the School of Public Health, Ford School of Public Policy, and University of Michigan Medical School have pointed otherwise. While they all generally stated that masking in common areas has lessened, Avani says that because of her background as a public health student, her “peers have been receiving the mandates well because (they) all care about the health of (their) community.” Gorka also says that in the Ford buildings, “masking has become sort of a cultural thing,” where people are still generally masking even if it’s not required. Vaishnav also mentions that there is a similar sentiment in the medical school. Obviously, masks are still mandated in patient care areas, but she says “the overall response from our deans and from the student body is that there’s a heightened level of responsibility of caution that we have to exercise compared to the rest of the general population that aren’t involved with immunocompromised people.” From that perspective, many people are still masking in common areas, despite it not being mandated by the university.
Where to go from here
After several years of the pandemic, it’s been a challenge to navigate what the right thing to do is at any given time. How do we balance the comforts of pre-Covid life with the reality of the dangers of Covid? Overall, the students seem to have a mixed perspective on whether or not it was a good time to remove the mandate. Gorka says that “it wouldn’t have hurt to just keep the policy in place for the rest of the semester.…It just sort of seemed like an extra risk that, while relatively small, is still there.” Jaikamal notes that it’s likely a complicated decision: “I am sure the decision was made with all the information at hand. I know the community case counts are currently at an all time low and this means transmission is less likely, so maybe it was the best time to make the decision if it had to be made eventually.”
In general, it seems like a mix of apprehension and excitement at these new policies is consistent with students at the university. As we continue to slowly loosen Covid-19 masking policies, it will be important to continue using all the available information at hand to make informed decisions about how to balance comfort with the risks of Covid.
Dr. Karvonen-Gutierrez said that the future of mitigating Covid will be similar to our response to the flu. “Over the next several years, the Covid pandemic is going to shift into quantification the way we do flu cases. We still count flu cases every single year, but we don’t count the cases of someone who had the flu and never went and got tested. As we continue to move through this, the [SARS-CoV-2] virus will likely continue to evolve in a way that will be beneficial to the virus by being more transmissible and less severe.”
Looking to the future, to keep yourself and those around you safe, Dr. Karvonen-Gutierrez says to get vaccinated. She believes that we will start to see a vaccine schedule in the future much like influenza, where we will have to get booster shots with some degree of regularity, based upon the most circulating variants. Secondly, Dr. Karvonen-Gutierrez recommends that people practice mitigation strategies in high-density environments. “We are now at a different stage of the pandemic with high quality masks. We know that a KN95 or a KF94 work not only to protect other people, but to protect ourselves,” Dr. Karvonen-Gutierrez said.
At this point in the pandemic, we have the access to public health mitigation measures that we can operate and exercise at an individual level. Regardless of a university’s policy, it is essential that we hold ourselves accountable to ensure that we keep ourselves and those around us safe by getting vaccinated and practicing mitigation strategies. Not feeling well? Quarantine until a negative test confirms you are Covid-free. Exposed to someone with Covid? Monitor your symptoms and get tested as necessary. Going somewhere where many people will be congregating? Bring and wear a well-fitting mask. Even though the university no longer considers masking a requirement in many indoor spaces, we are still responsible for our own safety. It is now up to us to do what is right to keep Ann Arbor and ourselves healthy.
Feature photo by Ehsan Ahmadnejad on Unsplash