NYC School Mask And Business Vaccine Mandates To End March 7

NEW YORK, NY — School mask mandates and vaccine requirements for New York City businesses will end Monday as the city's coronavirus positivity rates continue to drop, Mayor Eric Adams announced Friday.

Public school students will no longer be required to wear masks on campus and Key To NYC mandates requiring vaccine checks at local businesses will be suspended, said the mayor.

"New Yorkers should be getting out and enjoying our amazing city," Adams said Friday. "We are open for business and New York City has its groove back.”

The school mask mandate will be lifted for students kindergarten through 12th grade, but kids in pre-K classrooms and daycare facilities will still be required to wear masks, given high hospitalization rates among children under 5 years old, who are not eligible to be vaccinated.

Social distancing, cleaning and other school coronavirus protocols will remain in place while the city monitors the impact of removing the mask mandate, health officials said.

The suspension of the vaccine requirements — which were first put in place in August — will apply to all restaurants, fitness facilities and other entertainment spaces that previously had to check each customer for proof of vaccination.

The rollbacks come as New York recovers from an Omicron wave that saw record-breaking surges in COVID-19 cases in December and January, and one week after Adams told city dwellers to expect them.

The citywide seven-day average positivity rate stood at 1.8 percent Friday and positivity in the city's public schools was at 0.18 percent, Adams said.

"We are far from out of the woods, COVID is still here, but we are beating it back," Adams said at a press conference in Times Square.

Though the vaccine mandate faced protests and lawsuits, Adams said 94 percent of businesses complied while it was in place.

For both lifted mandates, individual students and businesses can still decide if they want to keep wearing masks or requiring vaccine checks, according to the mayor.

"We are not going to get in the way of your discretion," Adams said.

The mayor's announcement comes after Gov. Kathy Hochul lifted the statewide mask mandate for schools starting March 2. City officials have already dropped outdoor masking at schools.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has issued new guidance that allows students to take of their masks when surrounding community case rate and hospitalizations are low.

The mayor noted that the city will reevaluate the mandate rollbacks should positivity rates change.

The city created a color-coded system to track the transmission rate and advise New Yorkers based on the level of spread.

"COVID changes," Adams said. "It shifts, it modifies — we must be open to do the same."