UCI Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Hal Stern sent an email on Friday, July 15, announcing that masks would be required indoors, campuswide, effective July 18.
Mask mandates are not new to UCI students. After the campus shutdown through the entire 2020-21 school year due to COVID-19, many students felt optimistic about returning for the 2021-22 academic year. Many classes returned to in-person instruction with required masking in all indoor campus buildings.
On March 19, Executive Vice Chancellor Stern announced that the mask mandate had been changed from “mandatory” to “recommended” due to updated guidelines from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and the California Department of Health (CDPH).
However, the mask policy has since been reinstated, making many students wonder “for how long?”
With the rapid influx of COVID-19 cases in Orange County, there’s no saying how long the policy will be in effect.
UCI professor of Biology David Camerini suggests that the upward trend of cases may be due to the massive rush of tourists migrating to California for the summer.
“Viruses tend to mutate towards greater transmissibility since that gives them a selective advantage,” Camerini said. In other words, the greater the population in one area, the more likely the virus will spread.
The rise of the new Omicron BA. 5 COVID-19 variant has caused concern throughout the UCI campus. David Souleles, Director of UCI’s COVID-19 Response Team, described why the new COVID variant is deadly.
“The BA. 5 variant appears to evade the vaccine’s ability to prevent infection in many cases so more people are being infected, though those vaccinated and boosted still have significantly less risk of more serious illness, including hospitalizations and death than those not vaccinated,” Souleles said to the New University. “Being infected with a prior variant of COVID-19 does not appear to provide as much protection against reinfection with BA. 5, so many more people are susceptible and becoming reinfected.”
In the email, Stern recommends testing for anyone experiencing any symptoms of COVID-19 or for anyone planning to travel or attend a large event in the near future. Testing continues to be readily available to students at the UCI Student Center Testing Site Monday-Friday from 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m.
Students can also indicate if they have any symptoms of COVID-19 through their daily symptom check email.
“Adherence to the requirements helps combat the spread of COVID-19 by breaking the chain of infection,” UCI Student Affairs Assistant Vice Chancellor and Chief of Staff Edgar J. Dormitorio said.
“Students should perform the daily symptom check to make it a habit to determine if they have symptoms and follow up with the Student Health Center so that they do not risk spreading the infection to roommates, family members, classmates or friends,” Dormitorio said.
Currently, the best thing for UCI students to do to protect against the new Omicron variant is to wear a mask indoors and avoid large gatherings.
“[The mask mandate] is the single most important thing that UCI can do in the short run,” UCI professor of Population Health and Disease Prevention Andrew Noymer said.
Noymer also emphasized the importance of not only wearing masks but ensuring you have the most protective masks possible.
“In this case, all masks aren’t created equal. N-95 masks are the most effective (against COVID-19) whereas surgical cloth masks and bandanas are not as good,” Noymer said.
UCI Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Hal Stern declined to comment.
James Huston is a Sports Co-Editor for the 2022-23 school year. He can be reached at hustonj@uci.edu.
