The Blaz goes full anti-mask

 

 NY Daily News 

 Mayor de Blasio balked at the idea of reinstating an indoor face mask mandate in the city on Monday even though COVID-19 infections are ticking back up. Instead, he called for more vaccination efforts throughout the five boroughs.

“Masks have value, unquestionably, but masks are not going at the root of the problem. Vaccination is,” the mayor said during a live-streamed press briefing. “So we do not intend a mask mandate. We do intend to double down on vaccination.”

Over the weekend, some local public health experts and lawmakers began calling for a resumption of indoor mask wearing for all New Yorkers — regardless of vaccination status — citing a slow but steady rise in coronavirus infections driven by the Delta variant.

But de Blasio said in his briefing that it would be “a disservice” to heed those calls and argued all focus should instead be on boosting vaccinations.

“Let’s address the problem by getting more people vaccinated and going right at it, and knocking down this variant,” he said from City Hall. “You know, a mask doesn’t arrest the progress of the variant — vaccination does. So we’re gonna go where the real impact is. That’s the bottom line.”

Democratic Manhattan Councilmember Mark Levine, who chairs the City Council’s Health Committee, took issue with de Blasio’s argument and said an indoor face mask mandate could safeguard New York against a major COVID-19 outbreak while the vaccination campaign continues.