Here's the Memorial Day weekend edition of my regular "Dispatches from #NYC on Masking/SD Trends in my corner of Manhattan (east village, gramercy, union square)".
This weekend is big every year (except last 😖) in NYC. It's the official start of the summer/tourist season.
This weekend is big every year (except last 😖) in NYC. It's the official start of the summer/tourist season.
In my walks today, keeping a quick mental count of about 500 pedestrians I encountered on this, the start of the first long weekend in the city with a huge majority of adults vaccinated. And permission from city, state, federal govts to remove masks outdoors if vaccinated....
~70% people still wearing masks, covering noses properly.
20% had masks under their chin or in hands, slipping them on if passing someone.
10% were unmasked. Interestingly, most of them were senior citizens! Presumably fully vaccinated. Until recently, universally masked!
20% had masks under their chin or in hands, slipping them on if passing someone.
10% were unmasked. Interestingly, most of them were senior citizens! Presumably fully vaccinated. Until recently, universally masked!
People outside NYC are befuddled by the high mask compliance even weeks after it got okay to take them off outside. People like me in NYC are not. It's the city's etiquette. Most people don't want to be "that guy". Why the city in reality is way nicer than the rude image.
Oh, and most people are also social distancing. I mean Americans generally had a "4 feet personal space if space permits" culture even before the pandemic. So it's now become second nature to move apart when passing someone, as much as possible in Manhattan foot traffic.
A non-trivial factor is also remnants of the politicization of masking by Trump and his sheep. Never in the history of the world has a leader been so widely hated and repudiated by his home city. For many of us (me included), being unmasked is still tied to maga, jan 6 etc.
Unexpectedly high compliance with masking not just in NYC, but the all-blue two-thirds vaccinated northeast is as much a political statement as going unmasked is/was for many maga types. Not a protest as such. More like not wanting to be seen as "that guy" storming the capitol.
Plus at least so far, there is no real cost to being masked. It's still pleasant weather. Seasonal flu at an all time low. Almost everyone is used to it.
But the first real humid heat wave in July will be the first real test of these norms. Then it might dip below 50%.
But the first real humid heat wave in July will be the first real test of these norms. Then it might dip below 50%.
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