New Mask Guidance For NJ As COVID Vaccine For Infants Approved

NEW JERSEY — With COVID-19 hospitalizations continuing to decline in New Jersey, federal health officials lifted mask recommendations Thursday in four counties. That leaves the Garden State with seven counties where people should mask up for indoor, public spaces, according to the CDC.

New Jersey's progress comes as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted emergency-use authorization to COVID vaccines for young children. The FDA approved Moderna's vaccine for children 6 months through 17 years old and Pfizer's for ages 6 months through 4 years.

The CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices will meet Saturday to greenlight the vaccines. But if they do, federal officials say children younger than 5 could start getting shots as soon as Tuesday.

The CDC recommends masking in counties with "high" COVID-19 community levels — a metric based on hospitalizations and case rates that the agency adopted in late February. The agency updates its color-coded COVID maps each Thursday.

This week, the agency recommended masking in Morris, Monmouth, Burlington, Camden, Atlantic, Cape May and Salem Counties. The CDC moved Sussex, Warren, Hunterdon and Ocean Counties out of the "high" category Thursday.

The CDC's mask recommendations don't trigger any mandates in New Jersey. People may also choose to continue masking in any setting.

The entire state still has high community transmission, according to the CDC. The map below shows COVID activity levels according to the CDC's prior framework for determining them, which prioritized transmission:

But New Jersey has progressed in key COVID metrics recently. Hospitals throughout the state had 791 patients with confirmed or suspected COVID as of Thursday, according to the New Jersey Department of Health. State health authorities tallied 928 coronavirus patients in hospitals on June 1 — New Jersey's highest total since last winter's omicron wave.

New Jersey has a transmission rate of 0.86 as of Friday morning after showing rates of 0.87 the week before and 0.96 two weeks prior. A transmission rate lower than 1 indicates that each existing infection causes less than one new infection, indicating the spread of the virus is slowing down.

The curve in New Jersey also continues to flatten from the springtime COVID wave. The state averaged 2,892 new daily cases this past week — well down from last month's peak of 5,073 daily infections for the week ending May 24, according to federal data.

For more coronavirus numbers, visit the state health department's COVID dashboard, The New York Times data page for New Jersey and the CDC's data tracker.