New York City Keeps Masking Toddlers

The school system’s policy is an exercise in senseless cruelty. 

By Karol Markowicz.

"New York City finally lifted its public-school mask mandate effective this week—with an exception that makes even less sense than the original requirement. “The indoor mask mandate is still active for children in LYFE, EarlyLearn (Infants & Toddlers), 3-K, Pre-K, and 4410 classrooms,” the city’s Department of Education tweeted March 4. Translation: The city will continue to force masks on the segment of the population at lowest risk for Covid, children 2 to 4.

The ostensible reason is that children under 5 aren’t eligible for vaccination. “People wanted to say, ‘Let’s lift it across the board,’ but that’s not what the science was showing us,” Mayor Eric Adams told reporters last week. “I know some people are concerned. I would rather people complain against me, than losing my babies in our city.”

The mayor is reduced to cheap emotional appeals because his position lacks logic. The New York state Health Department released a study last week that found “there is limited evidence on the effectiveness of the BNT162b2 vaccine on children, particularly those 5-11 years and after the Omicron variant’s emergence.” That’s the Pfizer shot, the only one approved for minors. Its effectiveness at preventing infection dropped to 12% for 5- to 11-year-olds during Omicron.

Only 43% of New York City kids 5 to 11 are vaccinated anyway, and the city doesn’t require vaccination as a precondition of school attendance. (It has also lifted its vaccine mandate for restaurants and other indoor venues.)

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the only public health agency in the world to recommend masking toddlers in the first place. They are at almost no risk of serious illness from Covid, and not a single study has found that masks help stop viral spread in this age group.

How could they? I’ve seen children chew on masks and wipe their noses with them. My 6-year old once took off his mask to gulp some hot chocolate, then used it as a napkin to wipe his upper lip.

And masks probably do real harm to young children. When a politician removes his mask to address an audience, he is acknowledging that masking makes communication more difficult. Little kids are hard to understand even when you can see their faces.

These are the foundational years, when children learn so much by reading faces, watching mouths and mimicking sounds. We used to understand the importance of early childhood but, like so much else, we’ve discarded that knowledge to poorly combat the Covid-19 virus.

But what do I mean, “we”? Many of us wanted sanity for a long time. I left New York for Florida last year to find it. Children under 5 should never have been masked. To keep this up in March 2022 is doubling down on failure—and cruelty.

Ms. Markowicz is a columnist for the New York Post."