On Wednesday, Rochelle Walensky, the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), told lawmakers that the agency would continue to recommend wearing masks in schools in certain areas where the community’s COVID-19 levels are high. The CDC’s existing masking guidance will remain the same as the country shifts its focus from treating the virus as a pandemic to an endemic threat.

According to Walensky, the CDC recommends schools implement prevention strategies, including masking, in areas where high levels of COVID-19 hospital admissions and cases are reported in the community or when an outbreak occurs within the school. “Our masking guidance doesn’t change with time, it changes with disease,” she said. “When there’s a lot of disease in the community, we recommend masks. When there’s less disease, masks can come off.”

At the joint subcommittee hearing for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers expressed her concerns about the mental and emotional toll masks have taken on children. Walensky responded by citing CDC data that showed school districts that did not take preventive measures, including masking, when recommended had more children getting sick and missing school compared to those that followed the recommendations.

Currently, most of the country is reporting low to moderate COVID-19 community levels, meaning masks are not recommended in those areas. Walensky stated that the CDC received feedback from 50 outside stakeholders, including parents, teachers, and school staff when drafting its COVID-19 guidance for schools.

Wednesday’s hearing focused on the federal government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, with lawmakers criticizing the CDC, National Institutes of Health, and other agencies for their handling of the situation. The Biden administration recently announced that it plans to transition the COVID-19 response to the private sector on May 11.