CDC explained its updated mask guidelines

On May 13, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that adults who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 could generally stop wearing masks indoors. 

CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said the new policy — a departure from guidance that for nearly a year recommended wide use of mask-wearing — was based on new evidence from studies in the United States and Israel that "show that COVID-19 vaccines work" and are effective against emerging coronavirus variants. 

Some social media users are sharing the idea that this change isn’t rooted in any firm reasoning and undermines the agency’s previous coronavirus guidance. One post says that "the CDC lifting those guidelines out of the blue with no solid explanation proves they lied to you the whole time about everything." 

The change in policy did surprise some public health experts, but it’s not true that the CDC didn’t explain its decision or that this proves the agency lied. 

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Before Walensky revealed the CDC’s new guidance for fully vaccinated people, she explained how the agency reached its decision. 

"Over the course of the pandemic, we are continuously gathering data and evidence to inform our guidance and decision making," she said on May 13. "We now have numerous reports in the literature that demonstrate the safety and real-world effectiveness of the authorized vaccines." 

Walensky then spoke about three recently published studies: one from Israel published in the Journal of American Medical Association and two from the United States, which were published in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. She listed some of the findings, such as that in Israel there was a demonstrated 97% vaccine effectiveness against symptomatic infection in more than 5,000 healthcare workers. And she noted that the CDC has been accumulating data that show COVID-19 vaccines are effective against variants.

"Considering all these factors — the data on vaccine effectiveness, the science on our ability to protect against circulating variants, and our growing understanding of the low risk of transmission to others, combined with universal access to vaccines for those 12 and older — today the CDC is updating our guidance for fully vaccinated people," she said. 

NPR described the policy change as "a dramatic reversal from the country’s top public health agency," and said that "many leaders in the public health world say they didn’t see the loosening of recommended restrictions coming so quickly." 

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Jeffrey Duchin, a physician with the Infectious Diseases Society of America, told reporters that "the return to normal activities is safe for vaccinated people, there is no debate about this." But he also said that the CDC’s announcement "led to widespread confusion and frustration because it was unexpected and needed context."

Others welcomed the decision. Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Center for Health Security at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Health, told USA Today that he thought the updated guidelines were "overdue" and that the "overcautious CDC" should have taken that action sooner. 

Our ruling

The post says that the CDC lifted its mask guidelines "out of the blue with no solid explanation," proving that the agency "lied to you the whole time about everything." 

The CDC presented its decision to update guidance for fully vaccinated people and explained that it was based on data showing the effectiveness of vaccines among those who have been fully vaccinated. 

We rate this post False.