One Illinois mayor is defying Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s (D) statewide mask mandate, lifting the requirement and making it optional.
Mayor Craig Johnson of Elk Grove Village is not enforcing the governor’s order, which requires those two and older to wear a mask when in indoor public areas.
“We have Amita Alexian Brothers right here in Elk Grove … hundreds of thousands of people a year go to that hospital and we watch the daily numbers,” he explained. “And the daily numbers I’ve been tracking in the single digits for months.”
According to ABC 7, there are currently seven coronavirus patients at that hospital, none of whom are on ventilators.
“We are following the science. That’s our key,” he said, questioning the governor’s line of logic forcing areas with low infection rates to mask up.
“And the science has said, according to the governor last spring. Once you drop below 5 percent, he’d open up. Well today we are at 1.6, 1.7 percent. Why aren’t we opening?” he asked.
The mayor also noted this week that the village has held a number of events without any coronavirus breakouts.
“We have to start moving on. We’re as safe as we can be. If you want to wear a mask, wear a mask,” Johnson said. “But it’s time to move on.”
Pritzker reinstated the mask mandate in late August and has shown no signs of lifting the mandate. Dr. Allison Arwady of Chicago’s health department said they will have a “better sense by, I think, Thanksgiving” on whether they will lift the mandate.
On Thursday, she suggested masks are “part” of the reason places can currently remain open.
“Illinois is doing much better than all of the states around us from a COVID perspective. That’s not an accident,” Arwady claimed.
“I have no intention of changing what we’ve been doing all along, which is sticking to the best evidence that we have for things that have [allowed] us to stay open,” she added.