“Anyone who is fully vaccinated can participate in indoor or outdoor activities, large or small, without wearing a mask or physical distancing,” CDC chief Rochelle Walensky said at a White House news briefing today. “If you are fully vaccinated, you can start doing the things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic. We have all longed for this moment when we can get back to some sense of normalcy.”

      The CDC still recommends that vaccinated people wear masks on planes, buses, trains and other forms of public transportation as well as health-care facilities, prisons and homeless shelters, as well as places where state and local governments or businesses require masks.

      Walensky cautioned that if COVID-19 numbers begin to rise again, the new mask guidance could be rolled back, adding: “The science is also very clear about unvaccinated people. You remain at risk of mild or severe illness, of death, or spreading the disease to others. You should still mask, and you should get vaccinated right away’.