Editorial: Masks should be required

MANDATE MASKS

Mask-optional policies need to wait

The staff editorial represents the opinion of the majority of The Highlander editorial board

Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s recent executive order makes masks in schools a family’s choice statewide. But overwhelming evidence and majority opinion at McLean High School mean masks should remain required—at least in FCPS.

Official case counts and seemingly endless contact tracing have reminded us that COVID-19 spreads in schools. What isn’t entirely clear is how requiring masks is somehow detrimental to students, particularly those in overcrowded buildings like McLean.

Masks prevent sick individuals from spreading disease vectors, and in countries like Japan and South Korea, it was customary to wear masks in public when feeling sick even before the pandemic.

Wearing a mask in a building full of immunocompromised teachers and students, elderly employees and hourly, low-paid staff and substitutes who may have poor health insurance is simply the right thing to do.

Practically everyone at McLean has the physical capacity to wear a mask. It was never difficult: it’s a light, breathable cloth that covers the mouth and nose and fits snugly against the face. It’s not a dog muzzle, and it’s highly unlikely someone will asphyxiate with one on (hint: take the mask off momentarily if having difficulty breathing).

So no, masks are not traumatic torture instruments scarring a generation of students, as some opponents might suggest. They’re a time-tested product that is intended to protect public health.

Masks aren’t an infringement of personal liberty, an argument mask-optional supporters frequently make. If masks should become optional because they encroach on liberty, the federal income tax and state vehicle registration might as well be abolished too, since any small inconvenience for the collective good of society is now apparently an egregious violation of personal rights.

In a poll of 207 McLean students, 72% said they felt masks should remain required in FCPS. If a majority of residents in other jurisdictions feel otherwise, their school districts should be free to make that decision themselves. Opinion on masks has become so attached to political identity that the executive office should not be making overarching decisions for everyone.

That’s especially true when the governor who signed the executive order sends his son to a private high school in Maryland. Politicians who make important decisions affecting students should at least have the ethical commitment to send their children to schools in the same state where they craft their policies.

Many public spaces like coffee shops are mask-optional, but social distancing is possible to a resonable extent in these locations, and there is adequate air circulation to keep visitors safe.

Neither are possible at overcrowded McLean. At a PTSA meeting in January, FCPS School Board Representative for the Dranesville District Elaine Tholen even admitted that a McLean family was the first to discover inadequate air circulation in many classrooms across the school.

If masks are to become optional, FCPS and its high school administrations need to be more proactive and responsible in preventing the spread of COVID-19. That includes faster contact tracing, more transparency with families and robust infrastructure to ensure frequent air circulation and prevent crowding in hallways.

We all want to get rid of masks soon. The time is coming, but for now, the social benefits of wearing a mask overwhelmingly outweigh the costs for most people in the school building. When it’s time to finally make masking a personal choice, individual districts should be deciding when it’s appropriate, not the state government.