Illinois governor aims to lift indoor mask mandate for most places by end of February

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) announced his intention to lift the state’s indoor mask mandate for most places by the end of February, though the decision would not affect K-12 schools, WGN-TV reported.

The indoor mask mandate will be lifted in most places by Feb. 28, Pritzker said ahead of an expected announcement regarding details of the plan, according to the local news outlet. 

“My intention is as we’ve seen these numbers peak at about 7,400 hospitalizations, and heading downward significantly — we’re now I think under 2,500 hospitalizations, so that’s almost a third of where we were at the peak and heading even further downward — to lift the mask mandate in the indoor locations by Feb. 28,” the governor said in a press conference on Wednesday ahead of his expected announcement, according to NBC Chicago. 

Noting that COVID-19 conditions were improving across the state, he acknowledged that K-12 schools were still “sensitive locations.”

“Of course, we still have the sensitive locations of K-12 schools, where we have lots of people who are, you know, joined together in smaller spaces, thousands of people interacting in one location at a time,” Pritzker said, according to NBC Chicago. “And so that’s something that will come weeks hence. But very importantly, things are getting better across the state of Illinois.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) sounded a similar note on Wednesday, saying that both the indoor mask and vaccine requirements for her state would end on Thursday while noting that schools would still require masks to be worn.

But health officials are urging states against relaxing COVID-19 measures, which some worry is premature. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky said during a White House briefing on Wednesday that recommendations to relax mask mandates were not yet being issued by the agency. 

“We are working on that guidance,” Walensky said, but “our hospitalizations are still high, our death rates are still high. So as we work towards that and as we are encouraged by the current trends, we are not there yet.”