Americans are taking fewer precautions two years into the pandemic, a poll says.
As the pandemic enters its third year in the United States, fewer Americans are reporting wearing masks in recent months, according to the survey. released on Tuesday Associated Press and NORC.
About 44 percent of Americans reported this month that they habitually wore a mask outside the home, up from about two-thirds during the peak of the Omicron wave in January, according to a survey of 1,082 U.S. adults from March 17 to 21.
Only about a third of Americans said this month that they still avoid others as much as possible, compared with more than half just two months earlier. About 40% said in March they continue to avoid non-essential travel, up from 60% in January.
According to the survey, people aged 60 and over were most likely to report taking precautions more than two years after the pandemic began.
Andrew Neumer, professor of public health at the University of California, Irvine, said the survey results reflect a lull in the pandemic in the country, with US cases at their lowest level since the Omicron winter surge.
“Partly it’s due to fatigue,” he said, “and partly because the CDC has allowed them to take fewer precautions.”
In February, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention asked most Americans to stop wearing masks.
Dr. Neumer added that the survey showed that now and in the coming years, “Americans are less interested in camouflage wherever they go outside the home.”
In the future, Covid vaccines will be one of the best ways to control the pandemic and reduce the incidence, according to Dr. Arnold S. Monto, professor of epidemiology and global public health at the University of Michigan School of Public Health.
