By: Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner
Gov. J.B. Pritzker has issued a new executive order requiring all Illinois public and private school students to wear masks when they return to school later this month, taking away the authority of school districts to make their own decisions based on local COVID conditions. The governor continues to act unilaterally, even though the state’s ability to manage COVID has improved dramatically in recent months.
The mandate goes further than the CDC’s most recent guidelines, which only recommend mask wearing. “Far too few school districts have chosen to follow the federal CDC prescriptions for keeping students and staff safe,” the governor said. Pritzker said that he has legal authority to enforce his order.
The governor’s mandate is a dramatic step back for students who, for more than a year, have suffered disproportionate harm from the restrictions imposed because of COVID. Since the virus emerged in March 2020, any concerns over the mental health of more than 2 million children were subordinated to the overall fear of the virus. The damage done by school shutdowns – anxiety, depression and even suicide – has been harsh, especially considering the near-zero risk COVID poses to students and the limited risk students pose to others in school settings.
The state’s improved COVID status simply doesn’t warrant a mask mandate for kids, and continued masking only serves as a constant reminder to students of the harm they’ve experienced. Illinois students need a return to normalcy, and Gov. Pritzker has just single-handedly taken that away.
The situation in schools today has entirely changed from last year. While the Delta variant is a hurdle – more on the variant below – the reality is that deaths, hospitalizations and even cases are still 80 percent or more off of the pandemic’s peak. A big reason for that is the availability of vaccines for those that want them – more than 90 percent of the elderly and a majority of adults in Illinois have had at least one shot. Teachers are overwhelmingly vaccinated, a result of being prioritized by the state early on in the vaccination roll out. Hospitals, too, are better prepared and treatment has markedly improved since last year.
The overall collapse in the severity of the crisis means school districts should return to making student mental health a top priority – and that includes making mask-wearing optional, not mandated as Pritzker demands.
The state’s situation is dramatically different from where it was pre-vaccine.
1. All of COVID’s key metrics have collapsed dramatically compared to their pre-vaccine peaks. Daily cases are down 80 percent compared to their November 2020 peak. Hospitalizations are down 84 percent. Most importantly, average daily COVID deaths are down to about ten a day, 95 percent lower than their peak in December of last year. Deaths have yet to show any real reaction to the increase in cases due to the Delta variant.
2. Hospitals still have considerable capacity to deal with any increase in patients. That hospitals might get overwhelmed was a legitimate concern early on in the pandemic. But the last year and a half has shown Illinois’ healthcare system has more than enough capacity to handle any increase in COVID patients.
About a quarter of Illinois’ hospital beds are currently empty. That’s about 8,400 beds – more than the maximum 6,200 COVID patients that were hospitalized during the peak of the pandemic. Ditto for ICU beds, where 23 percent of the capacity is available (over 2,000 ICU beds are currently being used by non-COVID patients).
3. A vast majority of Illinois’ most-vulnerable populations, and a majority of adults, have been vaccinated. Vaccines weren’t even considered a possibility when school started last year. Today, almost 92 percent of Illinoisans aged 65 or older have received at least one vaccination jab along with 75 percent of everyone over the age of 18.
The Delta variant hasn’t stopped vaccinations from working
The Delta variant deserves attention given it’s the cause of the recent jump in COVID cases in Illinois and across the nation. The fact that the strain is more infectious is concerning, but the majority of the evidence so far has shown Delta to be no more dangerous than its predecessors – especially to the vaccinated. From the WSJ editorial board:
The CDC estimates there are about 35,000 symptomatic infections among 162 million vaccinated Americans a week. As cases have increased nationwide, so have breakthrough infections. This is to be expected. But recent studies show that vaccines are still 88% protective against symptomatic illness and 96% against hospitalization and death.
The good news is that in Illinois, “breakthrough” cases remain rare with just 714 hospitalizations reported so far. Illinois IDPH Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said in todays’ press conference that of the 6 million vaccinated in Illinois, there have been 180 breakthrough deaths, or just 0.003 percent of the total. She recently called breakthrough cases a “unicorn.” And Gov. Pritzker reiterated the safety of vaccines: “…the likelihood of a vaccinated person testing positive for COVID-19 remains extremely low and most importantly, these vaccines are doing what they are designed to do, essentially to eliminate the risk of hospitalization and death.”
Nationwide, 99 percent of current hospitalizations for COVID are among unvaccinated people, meaning that breakthrough variants have not yet posed a serious risk to those vaccinated.
What then is the point of mandating schoolchildren to wear masks?
It can’t be to protect kids themselves from the virus. Vaccinated or not, CDC data shows the survival rate for those age 19 and under at 99.997%. Children are more likely to die of cancer, homicide, heart disease, accidents or suicide than from COVID, as Wirepoints has shown previously.
And it can’t be to protect the vaccinated adult population. Government officials remain adamant that the vaccines work in protecting against serious illness and death. Pritzker and Ezike during their recent press conference reiterated that vaccines “are the best tool” against COVID.
That leaves unvaccinated adults – the vast majority who are unvaccinated by choice. It makes no sense to inflict masks on schoolchildren to protect a segment of the population who have taken on that risk by choice.
Children have suffered greatly over the past year
Children have suffered disproportionately not from COVID itself, but from the restrictions related to COVID since the beginning of the pandemic. In fact, the data has shown almost from the very beginning that the risks of COVID are dwarfed by the long-term emotional, physical and developmental harms that restrictions have imposed on all children.
Much has already been written about the damage done over the past year and a half due to remote learning and social distancing: the crippling impact of isolation, increased anxiety, the loss of critical development time, the physical harm of less exercise, the increased risk of teen suicide, unreported child abuse, and more. Many of those issues have coalesced into a crisis for youth, leading, for example, to some of the many tragic examples below:
- Loneliness, Anxiety and Loss: the Covid Pandemic’s Terrible Toll on Kids
- The Toll That Isolation Takes on Kids During the Coronavirus Era
- The Cost of the School Shutdowns
- Kids’ Weight Gain in the Pandemic Is Alarming Doctors
- Emergency Department Visits for Suspected Suicide Attempts…
- Let Children Go to Summer School
- Children’s Hospital Colorado Declares A State Of Emergency Over Kids’ Mental Health
Now with this latest mask mandate we’re risking a permanent disruption of development for a generation of children. Younger kids – again, those least likely to contract or spread COVID – have had the development of key social and communication skills disrupted by mask-wearing. From the WSJ:
“…the evidence is overwhelming that masking can harm children’s developmental progress. Look at the World Health Organization’s guidance document on child masking, which says that up to age 5, masking children may harm the achievement of childhood developmental milestones. For children between 6 and 11, the same document says that mask guidance should consider the “potential impact of mask-wearing on learning and psychosocial development.”
It is up to parents and officials to ensure that more unnecessary harm isn’t inflicted on students in the name of “an abundance of caution.”
The mandate goes too far
Unfortunately, most, if not all, school districts are likely to go along with the Governor and Board of Education’s new mask mandate. “ISBE has the ability to remove recognition status for a school if it is not following the mandates,” the governor warned in the masking press conference.
But officials that are positive about their students’ vaccination status and the overall health of their communities should be confident in challenging the state’s overbroad and overreaching restrictions.
Schools should put the mental wellness of students first by making mask-wearing optional. After a year of incalculable harm, we owe it to our kids to return their classrooms to normal.
Masks are a constant reminder to students of the harm they’ve experienced. A return to normalcy is the antidote.
Read more about the COVID-19 pandemic in Illinois:
Audio and summary 
If this bill passes, say goodbye to local control over all Illinois parks and expect to see open drug and alcohol use, needles, no sanitation and fire hazards, but no ordinary park users.
“The mandate goes further than the CDC’s most recent guidelines”
Pritzker is on a power trip and the sooner people recognize this, get out and vote to eliminate him things will never change and only get worse.
You wrote many adults are unvaccinated by choice, which is untrue. Many are waiting for the Novavax vaccine as it is a non mRNA vaccine and it hasn’t used fetal cell lines in production and/or testing of the vaccine. I refuse to endorse murder of innocent children, no matter what degree, and have the right to under my God given right to freedom of religion.
Senator Darren Bailey WON a lawsuit against the governor’s extended 30 day executive power. Can’t anything be done to enforce that and put the decisions back into the house and senate’s hands??
He took away parent power now – but his is gone in 2022.
My 600 pound governor announced he is rerunning. I wonder how long till he joins the other governors tradition of going to prison…
Pritzker is a tyrant for believing that he can unilaterally mandate masks on everyone in all public and private schools and daycares across Illinois. If you are a parent and the school or daycare that your child attends is imposing a mask mandate and you have the means and ability to enroll your child in a different school or daycare or to homeschool, you may want to consider those options. If you don’t have the means or ability to change schools or daycares, that is fine as well. Everyone’s situation is different. In that case, I encourage you to push… Read more »
Well said Spike! This is not a Dem or Rep issue – this is our freedom at risk. If anyone thinks that is an exaggeration – look around!
Multiple public school districts in my part of the state are standing up to the governor. They are not requiring students to wear masks. Instead, they are allowing students to breathe and learn in person. We just need about 600 more communities / school districts to stand up against the destruction of our youth.
Look what happened to Timothy Christian today. I highly doubt multiple school districts will end up defying the governor on masks when it’s all said and done. Student athletes missing out on sports will cause the schools and parents to buckle.
Alberta lifts all covid restrictions because they can’t produce an isolated sample of SARS-CoV-2 to prove covid exists to back their mandates. Patrick King forced the government to admit either covid doesn’t exist, or there’s something they don’t want us to know about the virus.
SarsCov2 has never been isolated. The covid hoax is all about giving you the lethal injection. It’s all about depopulation
There are the pro vaxx and anti vaxx. Both sides refuse to listen to the other except the pro vaxx have the power and don’t care how many die from the mrna injection. They are pathologically hell bent in killing as many while claiming to save. If they listened they would have to admit that the makers of masks has a disclaimer stating that Masks do not block any pathogen and research shows the ill health from wearing it. They would have to admit OSHA regulations on masks showing a drop in oxygen intake within 20 seconds of wearing one.… Read more »
The timing of this article is really disgusting, when Florida, Texas and Louisiana pediatric hospitals are at capacity with children suffering from Covid.
If this is an example of your “research”, then it’s pathetically lacking.
Basic Material Science :
The diameter of the virus particles is around 0.12microns.
Surgical masks, tested at 60 to 80 percent filtration, and what most ‘fastiduous’ parents seem to choose, filter particles as small as 0.3 microns.
0.3 >> 0.12
Masks are materially ineffective unless we progress to full face sealed respiratiors, and assuming the intention is to stop aerosol propogation.
How do you like them apples?
Facts vs. Feelings .. bugger off Abe.
you cant tell a leftist anything factual,they live off of feelings and virtue seeking-“im abe,and look at what an awesome person i am!”
I tell people all the time, with some of these people you can stare at the sky and say “look, it’s blue!” and they will say “no, it’s green, it’s a GREEN sky!!!” There’s no reasoning at all. And of course if the shoe was on the other foot politically they will completely flip flop their position. Argh!
I am pretty Sure this article was strictly about the current status in Illinois. Also, please link your statistics on the children infection rates in those states from factual CDC citings or their public health departments.
So let’s talk about “research”. We have the Army’s biological research center at Ft. Detrick. We have NIH and CDC. Since at least 9/11, 20 years ago, all of these agencies should have been studying how to deal with a respiratory virus infection in an urban area. If they did not, it is a clear dereliction of duty. Even Hollywood screenwriters were writing scripts about the possibility. So when the scenario actually happens, their recommendation is to follow what they used in small African villages to contain Ebola. Remember when “contact tracing” was the key to stopping the virus? They… Read more »
Abe Bolden – go back to CNN where they believe your crap.
You failed to include the biden/harris continued crisis at the border. It has been ongoing for over 6 months of covid aliens being released in those states, and that is contributing greatly to increased outbreaks. With record numbers each month of covid aliens entering in facilities above capacity, creating mega spreader events.
To me, this is a matter of prioritizing kids over adults. Kids face no material risk and they have already paid too high a price in this pandemic. How much more protection should adults get at the expense of kids? Less than they have been getting, I think.
Thank you for pointing this out Mark. It is so disturbing to see what has been done to children, supposedly to “protect” adults. There is no evidence that schools and children are spreading the virus.
And let’s not forget the pension mess and other public debt they will be left with.
What kind of people and society do this to their children?
The rich and the wealthy do this to the children
Only a culture like this and spoiled boomers would sacrifice kids for a perceived (of course not real) benefit. Even sicker than you thought.
I think Pritzker made exactly the right decision and this reporting is uninformed with respect to the risks of the Delta variant. I think Pritzker should go further and require proof of vaccination for people visiting indoor restaurants, bars and gyms.
yea,i need the government to tell me what to do cuz im not smart enough to figure things out for myself,huh john
Why don’t you ask big boy when to go to the bathroom, when you can leave your house and when you can eat. Come on man, think for yourself, it is a free country, COVID is not a death sentence. I have a better chance of getting shot in Chicago than I do dying from COVID
John, how is the reporting uninformed? If you really want to change minds, cite something that gives people pause. Instead you make a blanket assertion and do nothing to back it up. Ted and John did some nice work pointing out their arguments, and now I’d like to hear yours. That’s what “democracy” and free speech is all about. Use it and help others see your point of view, instead of virtue signaling. And, for the record, my understanding from the CDC is that they expected the Delta variant to be more contagious but less deadly, as all viruses evolve… Read more »
Thank you Communist Party member….
johns not a communist,hes a leftist with a linc card
Go fly a kite pal.
John Clark – go back to the hole you crawled out of.
It is the government’s failure to approve Ivermectin to fight covid that is the root cause of the problem.
Ivermectin and other therapeutics were deliberately suppressed by drug companies and the government to promote vaccines instead (which only rec’d emergency authorization without those very therapeutics).
17 months of executive power abuse, all from a napkin drawing showing a theoretical flattening of a curve.
Hospitalizations in Illinois are higher than they’ve been throughout the pandemic.
They climb higher every day. Just not from COVID.
Pritzker’s lockdowns have made people fatter and poorer and therefore sicker.
Look at the hospital data.
I’ll say it again, hospitalizations in Illinois are the highest they’ve been throughout the pandemic.
If we care about people’s health, or hospital capacity, this needs to be reported by the media.
That is what I don’t understand, the media is so focused on who has the virus and how bad it is, why don’t they highlight the people that got it and had no issues or mild issues with it. Then focus on all the overweight people, the people that smoke, etc….because of the choices they made, it was their choice just like the vaccine and whether to wear a mask or not
I live across the border in Indiana,and find it ironic everytime I see a person in a mask stop in a cigarette store and come out with 5-10 cartons,must really care about their health wearing a mask and all
I laugh at that too, or Pritzker eating a few more donuts to get just “little” bigger. Why doesn’t he set the example as a leader and lose some weight….oh I forgot, he isn’t a leader, whatever his buddies are doing in NY and CA he follows, well both of them are about to be out of office
Bill, regarding your question about the media, one simple phrase: “If it bleeds, it leads”
No doubt about that Hank, people love bad stories
We are raising a generation of isolated, friendless, fearful, anti-social, porn-watching, indoctrinated kids with their phones practically surgically grafted to their hand. Sad, your kids, if you have them, are going to be one big f’ed up group some day… mentally fearful, indoctrinated, fetal, incapable of marriage / relationships, funless and lonely, etc. and probably living with you forever. In adulthood they will be woke and perpetually “outraged”.
Could not have said it better myself. Been saying it for a long time. The more compliance the worse it will get for everyone.
Now the sheep will finally wake up. They will no doubt see those that lied to them for who they are. Sociopaths that only want your compliance and to further their grip on power.
Get your kids jabbed and take he jab yourself. Thereafter all will be well!!
Nah. Who am I kidding. The sheep are sheep for a reason.
They will direct their anger and hate toward those that told them they were being lied to rather than those that lied to them.
Spot. On.
They have started doing this already.
”it can never be the Official Governments Workers Party and Freddie’s fault”.
Hold the line. The ballot box is where we can change.