CDC guidelines on wearing masks for those vaccinated against COVID-19 is misguided and with all the changes, very confusing, so here is the best view of it (mine).

 

Yesterday, 5/13/21, CDC guidelines on wearing masks was released, and it announced that those who have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 may now safely walk about and do their daily lives inside and outside without any masks. This came on the same day that 7 New York Yankees who had been vaccinated have tested positive for the virus!

Although the whole world, rightly so, has pandemic fatigue and we are all tired of wearing masks and social distancing, etc, there are some serious facts to consider.

Current Vaccines

Although the current Phizer and Moderna vaccines have shown great promise in neutralizing different and newer strains, the full scope of vaccines ability to neutralize any unforeseen, or already circulating new strains of the virus is unknown.

Political pressures have caused the CDC guidelines on mask wearing. There is another reason I think: the government and the vaccine companies need data on the effectiveness of the vaccine with other circulating strains. Some of the strains that are causing the problems in Brazil, India, South Africa, and Europe were not considered in the design of the vaccine, because they were not known and or seen at the time.

We could be back to being a potential sitting duck for this virus. Im not taking that risk. I refuse to be a guinea pig for the government and will continue to wear my mask when in crowds outdoors, as I see my patients in the clinic, and when I visit a store or any spaces indoors.  Its too much at risk.  The kids in Brazil are having more problems than they were expecting kids to have with this virus.   Maybe I’m being too cautious but I’m staying off planes for now too until the unruly passengers become more civilized.  Imagine having gone thru the last fifteen months and then have some idiot expose you or your family to a new strain of virus on a plane.  No Thank you!

I wrote a blog on the relevance and need for some supplements for these times, in this link.  Please give it a read.

If you or any one you know are experiencing any long COVID symptoms, please consider acupuncture and herbal medicine, as it can be truly effective.

Updated 5/26/21:

CDC director Rochelle Walensky just about a month ago had said that she “fears an impending doom” regarding the numbers with COVID, only to follow up with no more masks needed.

5/24/21 reports show data that the new variants are being neutralized by the available vaccines, yet we are hearing of break thru infections continuously.

I think this is one of those situations where we take the facts and use our own intuition and gut feeling and decide what to do.

Wear masks inside, eat out in open spaces until more is known, wear a mask while walking with other people around specially when people go by on bikes or are jogging.  If they are infectious, they are spreading that virus and vaccinated or not, you may want to have a mask on and reduce your chances of infection/re-infection.

(7/1/21 updates)

There is a delta variant, we all know about from India originally.  Fortunately this delta variant seems to be somewhat neutralized by the vaccines currently in use.  A new variant however, epsilon, dominant so far in California, and found in all 50 states already,  has three mutations per spike.

Epsilon variant is NOT affected/neutralized by either of the RNA vaccines!  This is pretty scary folks and my suggestion is to keep wearing the mask, obviously indoors, but even outdoors when you see someone about to jog past, or a bike rider is about to go by, which is super easy to do, if its just below your chin.  I pull the mask on and feel a bit safer.  If somebody is jogging by or ridding their bike right past you and they are shedding virus, you want to lower the amount (titer) of virus that you come in contact with.  This is a nasty disease, no consistent or fully reliable pattern as to whom it affects, including very young and very healthy all too often, and must be avoided at all times.