SALT LAKE CITY – Utah’s mask mandate for the most part expires on April 10 – but that doesn’t mean everyone should celebrate the day by throwing away their masks, a public health expert advised.
The date on which the state’s mandate expires was set by a bill passed through the state legislature last week. Lawmakers said the date was the blessing of Governor Spencer Cox and the Utah Department of Health. The governor confirmed last week that he supported the bill’s mandate deadline, although he has not yet officially signed it.
Some parts of a mandate could exist after April 10, such as masks in companies or schools, but HB294 also set a July 1 deadline for all public health orders.
Even as the April date approaches, several health experts have urged people to exercise caution in public settings. That includes Dr. Todd Vento, an infectious disease physician at Intermountain Healthcare. That’s why he advises Utahns to continue wearing masks on and after April 10, especially in public indoor areas with less ventilation.
“To be honest, I would say there is no difference between April 9 and April 10; it is an arbitrary date,” he said, before acknowledging the provisions extending parts of the mandate beyond April 10.
It’s worth noting that there are provisions that keep certain requirements in effect between April 10 and July 1. For example, facial coverage may still be required for events and venues with more than 50 people after April 10. This also applies to companies and schools.
State or local health ordinances can remain in effect until July 1 if the state’s 14-day rate of cases exceeds 191 per 100,000 people, the state’s seven-day intensive care unit usage linked to COVID-19 higher is then 15%, or the state remains below 1.63 million prime doses of the assigned COVID-19 vaccine.
“I wouldn’t see April 10 as anything other than my own personal protection and for the personal protection of others,” added Vento. “When I’m not in public I probably have to be careful going to a place that is now 100% occupied and I don’t know about their ventilation system and people don’t wear masks because we don’t have a lot of our population have been vaccinated and they are still at risk, even though we have fewer cases and fewer viruses than, say, after Thanksgiving (s) after Christmas.
“The reality is we still have the virus. We still have a moving average of over 500 days and we still have – depending on which metric you’re using – 4% or 8% … positivity test,” he continued . “Those were numbers we had when we were on lockdown, so I know we’ve changed a lot. For example, we’ve accepted a lot because people want to get back to work and be normal. The reality we have in front of us is the reality. we need to address, not the reality we want it to be. We need to work towards that reality, and so I would encourage people to keep taking these precautions until (more herd immunity is achieved). “
The mandate’s modified expiration date came just weeks after the Utah Department of Health announced criteria to end the mask mandate in the state. State officials said they would begin phasing out the mandate in low transmission counties after the state received just over 1.63 million allocated prime doses. A prime dose is considered the first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine, or the one-time Johnson & Johnson vaccine.
State health service officials said the target of 1.63 million prime doses represents about 70% of Utah’s adult population. Health experts have said 70% to 90% of the herd’s immunity will likely need to be achieved to end the pandemic.
While the state plans to make the vaccine eligible for every adult in Utah on April 1, Cox staff estimated this week that Utah would have assigned about 1.5 million vaccines by April 10, which is just under 70% is.
Vento said there are still “many” people who are still reluctant to receive the vaccine. These include cultural, religious, entry, or mistrust barriers. Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson last week announced Utah’s new vaccine “roadmap,” designed to close some gaps, especially in access.
“We will not get up to 90% vaccinated. We still estimate 70% to 80% as our estimated herd immunity – most of which will be vaccine-induced herd immunity, because we are not sure how long natural immunity will last,” ‘said Vento.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released new guidelines this week on when the masks can come off. The guidelines state that people who are fully vaccinated – who received both shots of a dual vaccine or the Johnson & Johnson vaccine – can collect indoors with other fully vaccinated people or collect indoors with unvaccinated people from another household without a mask if the person is not or does not live with someone with an increased risk of COVID-19.
The main concern, Vento said, is that governments have and will continue to ease restrictions before better immunity to the herd is established. This poses not only the risk of re-spreading, but also the risk that the SARS-CoV-2 virus will mutate beyond the strains that vaccine manufacturers have already “really concerned” about.
“The more they broadcast, the more they replicate,” he said. “The more they mutate, the more chance there is of a mutation that is not covered by the vaccine.”
That’s why he, along with other public health experts in Utah and the rest of the US, is urging people to get the vaccine as soon as it becomes available to them.
Why does Utah have fewer confirmed variants?
During Friday’s virtual question-and-answer session with members of the media, Vento raised all kinds of questions about the pandemic, including variant strains of the coronavirus and how these could affect vaccination efforts.
This week, the state health service began reporting findings of three variants of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. The data updated Friday showed that 67 cases of the “United Kingdom” strain were found in Utah, with no confirmed cases of the “South Africa” or “Brazil” strains. It had listed 33 British variant cases on Thursday.
The South African strain, officially named B.1.351, is the variant that prompted Moderna to start a trial with an updated vaccine to ensure it protects humans as efficiently as the primary strain that emerged in late 2019.
So far, there is a lot of good data on many of the uses of our therapies and also our vaccines that should be responsive, but there is also some data that prompts us to maintain that caution, especially with that strain from South Africa.
– Dr. Todd Vento, infectious diseases physician at Intermountain Healthcare
Vento said one reason the number of variant cases in Utah is low is that the US has not tested for variants as often as other countries around the world, especially when compared to Europe. That’s in addition to some geographic division between the continents where the three largest variants originated.
Of course there are other strains of the coronavirus. Vento said Friday there have been reports of what is known as the “California variety” in Utah and a few other variants. Those strains are not currently reported in the health department data and they have not been studied as well in terms of their impact on vaccination efficacy.
He said he wanted to acknowledge the current facts about variants to give a full scope of the COVID-19 situation and not offer prospects that are “ doom and gloom ” or sugar-coated.
“(It’s) just reality. RNA viruses mutate, and a lot of those mutations do nothing. Some of those mutations improve the condition of the virus and make it easier for the virus to bounce around in the community,” he said . “So far there is a lot of good data on many of the uses of our therapies and also our vaccines to respond to, but there is also some data that prompts us to remain cautious, especially with that strain from South Africa.”
COVID-19 Beyond the Pandemic
Vento also spoke about the possible future after COVID-19 is no longer a pandemic, and said the future could very well mean there is at least one more vaccine “booster shot.”
Keep in mind that the drug manufacturers behind the vaccines have still not completed their research on the vaccines. They have about eight to 10 months of data from 100,000 individuals that will help figure out exactly how long the vaccine will protect against the coronavirus, Vento said Friday.
That means it is still not known whether the vaccine is a one-time deal or will become an annual vaccine like the flu. There is also a theory that a different dose could help against new COVID-19 variants. While these are all possibilities, there are still many unknowns.
What Vento advised Friday is that people could “count” on the fact that the current vaccination effort won’t be the end of COVID-19 vaccines.
“I would expect, and I think people should expect that at some point they will need some kind of supplemental vaccine,” he said. “Whether that’s every year, every two years – or if we get a big wave of a new type of variant, we might find that we need ‘Moderna-type 2’ as our next vaccine.