As Covid-19 cases fall and vaccines spread across the country, a handful of governors have dropped the mandates of the nationwide mask and increased tensions with some city leaders holding their own restrictions to fight new strains of the coronavirus.
Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds has dropped the mask mandate and restrictions on social gatherings this month, after the number of cases and hospitalizations dropped by about 80% since the fall peak and vaccination programs in nursing homes and relief facilities were underway.
“We need to make sure we do everything in our power to protect Iowans, especially our most vulnerable,” the Republican governor said in an interview. “But I also need to balance economies that support people who want to sustain a business or sustain their livelihood.”
Des Moines, Dubuque, Iowa City and several other cities are not planning to follow the governor’s lead to abandon the face-covering mandate, as several new strains of Covid-19 have arrived in the state and the vaccine explosion longer than expected.
“I think now is the time to be more zealous than ever,” said Frank Cownie, the Democratic mayor of Des Moines, who introduced his own mask mandate a few months before the state in August.