President Biden responded to American frustration with pandemic restrictions, saying that it was still too soon to end measures like indoor mask mandates, while suggesting that other restrictions may soon be able to end.
In the roughly 22-minute interview, some of which was previewed before Sunday, Mr. Biden said that a series of state governors announcing last week that they would begin lifting indoor mask mandates was “probably premature,” but acknowledged that making that decision is a “tough call.”
Most mandates won’t expire immediately, though some, like Nevada’s, ended immediately. New York’s stringent indoor mask mandate requiring businesses to ask customers for proof of full vaccination or require mask wearing expired on Thursday.
A new CBS poll found that a majority of Americans still support mask mandates, including in schools, but that many are exhausted and frustrated by a pandemic that is grinding into its third year. In schools, public health experts agree that mask requirements should not last forever, but differ on whether the time has come to remove them.
Mr. Biden suggested that rising rates of childhood vaccination, as well as the potential authorization of vaccines for even younger children, could allow schools to end their own mask mandates.
“Every day that goes by, children are more protected,” Mr. Biden said, adding that “the more protection they have, probably you’re going to see less and less requirement to have the masks.”
U.S. cases are falling fast, down to about 174,000 daily, a two-thirds drop over two weeks, according to a New York Times database. But hospitalizations, at about 95,000, and deaths, at more than 2,400 daily, remain very high.
As governors were lifting rules, officials in some cities, counties and school districts indicated that they would keep their own mandates in place, adding new complications to an already confusing array of rules across the country.
In New Jersey, Gov. Philip D. Murphy announced that school employees and students would no longer be required to wear masks beginning the second week of March. NJ.com reported that the Camden City School District would still require masks. Katrina McCombs, a superintendent for the district, told the outlet that while it was encouraging to see case numbers dropping in the state, school officials still “want to make sure our young people continue to be safe while in our care.”
The mayors of Boston and New Haven, Conn., also said masks would still be required in schools after their states’ mandates expire at the end of February.
That divide was especially stark in California, which is set to end an indoor mask mandate for vaccinated people in most public settings this month, but where counties are allowed to keep their own stricter measures. Health officials in some counties, including Marin, Orange, Sacramento, San Francisco and San Diego, pledged to lift strict local rules when the state does. Other counties — including Los Angeles and Santa Clara — said they would not ease restrictions until rates of vaccination, transmission and infection had improved.
Lester Holt, who hosted the NBC interview with Mr. Biden, noted that many of the people in the audience of this year’s Super Bowl would not be wearing masks, in violation of local law in Inglewood, Calif.
“I love how people talk about personal freedom,” Mr. Biden said in response. “If your exercising personal freedom puts someone else in jeopardy, their health in jeopardy, I don’t consider that being very dealing with freedom.”
Mr. Biden, however, acknowledged that measures taken to combat the virus have their own costs.
Mr. Biden did not directly address those Americans who refuse to wear masks, instead appealing to the unvaccinated: “People should get the shots. We know the shots work. We know they work for the variants that we are dealing with now.”
He added, “And I just think they should be careful, and if they’re not careful for themselves at least think of their children. Think of their — you know, their families.”
Esha Ray, Eduardo Medina and Katie Thomas contributed.
