Mitch McConnell Calls On State Governments To End Mask Mandates In Schools
Michael Cantrell
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Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has issued a call for state governments to end mask mandates for kids in school, as well as making the pivot away from emergency pandemic protocols as a means of expressing an acceptance of the reality that the coronavirus is here to stay.
“Across the country, bureaucrats are still forcing young children to wear masks to participate in society when neither kids nor vaccinated adults are remotely likely to get gravely ill,” McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, remarked on Wednesday. “What exactly are we doing here? Where are the goalposts? What is the end game?”
Some state governments, such as California and Illinois, both headed by Democratic governors, mandate masks in schools at the state level. Other states, such as Michigan and Indiana, leave that decision up to individual school districts, creating a patchwork of policies that have angered parents who argue masks stunt their children’s education.
Authoritative bodies have discouraged making young children wear masks. Although mandates are supported by the American Academy of Pediatrics, the World Health Organization maintains that “children aged 5 years and under should not be required to wear masks.”
McConnell also repeated calls from epidemiologists across the political spectrum, as well as fellow politicians, to “wind down” the state of emergency.
“The virus appears to be heading endemic,” the Kentucky senator said. “It’s time we accept that COVID is here to stay and we just need to get on with our lives.”
“He faulted Democrats with coalescing around a pandemic stance that favors stringent limits on what unvaccinated people can do in a move to obstruct the spread of the omicron variant, which has been shown to infect vaccinated and boosted people. McConnell, a survivor of childhood polio, is a strong proponent of vaccinations, unlike some members of his party. Still, he is a staunch opponent of vaccine mandates and “passes” that show vaccination status to gain entry in many restaurants and other businesses,” the report went on to detail.
“Disturbingly, whether or not we should trust the science and reclaim normalcy is somehow becoming a partisan question,” McConnell commented. “Millions of Democrats have decided that organizing their lives around COVID is core to their identity as progressives.”
It’s about time folks finally come to terms with this reality. As McConnell stated, this virus isn’t going anywhere. It’s here to stay. End of the story. It’s time to stop allowing an illness to control our lives.
It won’t be long before it weakens enough to be just another yearly cold.
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