Twitter Explodes Over CDC Extending Traveling Mask Mandate

Joseph CurlApril 14, 2022

Remember when it was “two weeks to flatten the curve”?

That’s apparently the thinking behind the decision on Wednesday by the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to extend the mask mandate for air and public transit travelers once again. The CDC said it was doing so to examine the new most prevalent variant of the virus that causes COVID-19, known as BA.2.

“In order to assess the potential impact the rise of cases has on severe disease, including hospitalizations and deaths, and health care system capacity, the CDC order will remain in place at this time,” the agency said in a statement extending the mandate until May 3.

The extension didn’t go over well on social media.

“Airline mask mandate extensions are nothing more than the last punitive gasps of a dying tyrannical movement,” conservative commentator John Cardillo wrote on Twitter.

“‘Never let a good crisis go to waste,’” Newsweek Opinion Editor Josh Hammer wrote.

Conservative radio host Buck Sexton dubbed the extension “lunacy,” adding, “The share of Covid that is spread on planes is statistically 0. This is all about political appearances and control. Libs are so pathetic.”

“The CDC is the best example yet that nothing is too oppressive, stupid, or pointless for bureaucrats to ram down your throat,” Sexton also wrote.

The CDC is the best example yet that nothing is too oppressive, stupid, or pointless for bureaucrats to ram down your throat https://t.co/qmaj5svgKL

— Buck Sexton (@BuckSexton) April 13, 2022

Experts also weighed in on the CDC extension. “I think it extends the inconsistencies,” Dr. Marc Siegel said on Fox News.

“CDC just recently a couple weeks ago said OK, now we’re going to focus on severity, on hospitalizations, on deaths, not so much on case numbers. Meanwhile, everything has gone down, including case numbers. Hospitalizations are at all-time low from the beginning of the pandemic. Deaths have gone down below 650 for the first time in a really long time. And case numbers are under 30,000 a day,” he said.

“If you’ve been on a plane lately, half the people are not wearing [masks] properly or taking them off for hours to eat. There’s no sense that you are making a safer environment there. The surgeon general told me today in an interview I just did he thinks the reason it’s staying in place is for people that have to go to work and have no other way to go there, and he wants a safe environment. CDC wants a safe environment. I don’t think it’s even working,” he said.

The extension came as a new poll found fewer than one in 10 Americans think the COVID-19 pandemic is still a “serious crisis.”

While 16% of Democrats think COVID-19 is still serious, just 3% of Republicans do, the Axios poll found.

Americans do think the virus continues to be a problem, but think it’s manageable. More than seven in 10 (73%) say so, with 17% saying COVID-19 is “not a problem at all.”

“Here’s another way to look at the overall numbers,” Axios wrote. “About twice as large a share of Americans said COVID-19 is ‘not a problem at all’ (17%) than said it is ‘a serious crisis’ (9%).”

“The latest wave of our national survey actually found a slight uptick in people’s perceptions of the risks of certain activities, including flying, attending sports events and returning to work. Yet it shows the highest share of Americans visiting friends and family members outside the home — and the lowest rate of social distancing — since the early part of last summer,” the website added.

“Americans are ready for coronavirus regulations to ease up – if they haven’t already,” the pollsters wrote.

Joseph Curl has covered politics for 35 years, including 12 years as White House correspondent, and ran the Drudge Report from 2010 to 2015. Send tips to [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @josephcurl.

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