Mothers of school-aged children are more likely to support mask mandates for all students and staff, while fathers are more inclined to oppose the protective measures, according to a new poll.
A survey released by Axios/Ispos on Tuesday found that 66 percent of mothers said they support mask mandates in schools, while just 50 percent of fathers agreed. Additionally, the poll found that more fathers—or 36 percent—said they oppose all COVID-19 mask mandates, compared to just 24 percent of mothers.
In general, the survey found that nearly 60 percent of parents said they support mask mandates in schools, but the issue continues to largely fall across poltical party lines.
For instance, 85 percent of Democrats and 66 percent of independents said they support the measure, while just 32 percent of Republicans agreed that students and staff should be required to wear facial coverings. However, Republicans aged 35 or younger are 10 percent more likely to back the measure than older conservatives.
Mask mandates have become a battleground issue in states such as Florida and Texas, where Republican governors have banned schools from implementing the measure and faced several challenges from local districts. Nonetheless, the poll found that opposition to school mask mandates is actually highest in Colorado (37 percent), Iowa (44 percent), Minnesota (38 percent), and Ohio (43 percent).
“The cross-state variability in Republican sentiment is notable,” Jon Cohen, the chief research officer for Momentive told Axios. “School politics is ultimately local too, so a deeper dive within the states is a clear next step.”
The poll was conducted from August 16-25 among 38,251 U.S. adults aged 18 or older. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 1.0 percentage points.
The survey comes as a growing number of schools across the country have moved to implement mask mandates in response to the surging coronavirus Delta variant. The highly contagious variant has spread quickly across unvaccinated populations and resulted in record numbers of children in hospitals.
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As of last month, states including California, Colorado, Louisiana, Oregon, Washington state, Virginia, Illinois and Wisconsin along with Washington, D.C., have all implemented mandates in schools, while several other school districts across the country have done the same.
In July, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated its mask recommendation to advise teachers, students and other staff members to wear face coverings in schools, despite their vaccination status. The CDC argued that face masks will need to be worn in schools because children under the age of 12 aren’t yet eligible to get a COVID vaccine.
On Sunday, Dr. Anthony Fauci said the best way to protect children from contracting COVID-19 is to surround them with vaccinated people and implement mask mandates.
“The way you protect children who, because of their age, cannot get vaccinated yet is to surround the children—be it friends, family, school teachers, personnel in the school—surround the children with vaccinated people,” the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases told CNN.
