A Kaiser Health News / PolitiFact fact check states that the claim that it is time to get back to normal is false.

“Here’s what science says to anyone who is honest about it: open schools, stop wearing masks outdoors and everyone at low risk should start living a normal life. Not next fall or next year – now, ”says the blog post, posted on Facebook on February 8.

KHN-PolitiFact sent a message to Sexton via his Facebook page to ask if he could provide evidence to support the statement, but received no response.

So we reviewed the scientific evidence and talked to public health experts about Sexton’s post. Overall, they disagreed, looking at the ways in which this goes against current public health strategies.

Let’s look at it step by step.

‘Opening schools’

In March, when government and public health leaders realized that the new coronavirus was spreading across the United States, many public institutions – including schools – were forced to close to prevent further spread. A large number of students ended the spring 2020 semester remotely. Some jurisdictions chose to reopen schools in the fall of 2020 and spring of 2021, while others have remained remote.

Throughout the pandemic, researchers studied whether classroom learning in schools significantly contributes to the spread of COVID-19. The results showed that if the K-12 schools adhere to mitigation measures – masking, physical distance and frequent hand washing – then there is a relatively low risk of transmission.

Here are some of the most recent research that tracks these positions:

• Only seven cases of COVID-19 out of 191 were screened at schools in 17 rural K-12 schools in Wisconsin that had high mask compliance and were monitored during the fall 2020 semester.
• Mississippi researchers found that most coronaviruses in children and adolescents were associated with meetings away from home and the lack of consistent use of masks in schools, but not associated with merely going to school or taking care of children.
• Thirty-two cases were associated with 100,000 students and staff attending 11 schools in North Carolina, where students were required to wear masks, practice physical distance and wash their hands frequently.

Of course, there are some limitations to these studies, which often depend on contact tracking, a process that cannot always identify the origin of cases. Some of the studies are also based on self-reported mask use by individuals, which may be inaccurate.

In addition, Hassig pointed out that not all school districts have resources, such as physical space, personnel or high quality masks, to open safely.

Sexton’s claim that schools can reopen leaves out important information: that safe reopening is highly dependent on the use of mitigation measures that have been shown to contain the spread of the virus.

‘Stop wearing masks out there’

As the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 is relatively new, research on the use of external masks is limited. But so far, science has shown that masks prevent transmission of the virus.

Sexton’s post, however, recommended that people stop wearing masks outside. To be sure, public health experts agree that the risk of transmitting the coronavirus is less outdoors than indoors. But experts also said that this does not mean that people should stop wearing masks.

In general, the prevailing scientific opinion is that, while it may be normal to be without a mask outside the home if you are physically distant from other people, wearing the mask is still recommended if you are around other people.

‘Everyone at low risk should start living a normal life’

All the public health experts we consulted agreed that this part of the claim is absolutely false. This goes against what scientists recommend that must be done to overcome the pandemic.

Although it is unclear what exactly the post means for “low risk” people, let’s assume that it refers to younger people or people with no health problems that make them more vulnerable to COVID-19. And that “living a normal life” refers to stop wearing masks, distance yourself from physical activity or washing your hands with increasing frequency.

Even if a low-risk person is not seriously ill, he can still infect others in high-risk groups.

“Everyone returning to ‘normal’ now, especially in the presence of more transmissible and deadly variants, would be a recipe for more public health disasters than we have ever experienced,” he added.

The drive to “get back to normal” is precisely what allows new variants to form and multiply, said Vreeman. “If we manage to speed up people’s vaccination and continue wearing masks in the meantime, only then will we have a chance to return to ‘normal’.”

In fact, because of the new variants circulating in the United States, Walensky and Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, asked Americans not to relax their efforts to control the spread of the virus.

A blog post by conservative talk show host Buck Sexton says that scientific evidence shows that we must now “open schools, stop wearing masks outside and everyone at low risk should start living a normal life”.

Scientific research shows that in order for schools to reopen safely, risk mitigation measures must be put in place, such as the requirement for masks, strict hand washing and limiting the number of students in classrooms. These changes, however, would not represent a return to normal, but a new normal for students and teachers.

The rest of Sexton’s statement departs further from current science. Research indicates that you are safer outdoors than indoors, but public health experts still recommend wearing masks in public, even outdoors. Science does not support the idea that it is the right time for some people to return to normal life. This would allow the virus to continue to spread and would have a high human cost in hospitalizations and deaths, experts said.

Sexton’s post is inaccurate. We classify it as False.