Oregon Officials Float Making Indoor Mask Mandate Permanent

Oregon’s health officials are considering making the indoor mask mandate permanent, which requires everyone age five and older to wear a mask in indoor public spaces.

Currently, the Oregon Health Authority’s rule requires individuals, even the fully vaccinated, to wear “masks, face coverings or face shields” in “all indoor spaces.” That includes “public and private workplaces, businesses, indoor areas open to the public, building lobbies, common or shared spaces, classrooms, elevators, bathrooms, transportation services and other indoor space where people may gather for any purpose,” according to the rule, which is set to expire in February. Because of that, health officials are expected to “propose making it permanent in order to allow the mandate to remain in place indefinitely,” according to Newsweek.

“None of us want to wear these masks forever, that is not the intent at all,” State Rep. Pam Marsh (D) told KOBI-TV. “It’s to recognize where we’re at in this public health emergency and enable us to continue with those mask requirements.”

The update follows news of the Oregon Health Authority’s Rules Advisory Committee working on a draft of a more “permanent set” of rules for masking in the state in December. Advocates stress that the rules would not necessarily mean masks forever. Rather, it the rule would mean masks “indefinitely.”

Oregon originally put a statewide mask mandate in place in May 2020, which remained in place until June 2021. But in August, Gov. Kate Brown (D)  implemented an outdoor mask mandate, requiring individuals to wear a mask in “all public outdoor settings where physical distancing is not possible, regardless of vaccination status.” That remained in place until November.

According to the New York Times’ coronavirus tracker, Oregon has reported a daily average of 187 cases per capita, representing an increase of 184 percent over the last 14 days.