Geneseo recommends masking indoors following rise in COVID cases

In response to a rise in active COVID cases on campus and in Livingston County, SUNY Geneseo recommends that students wear masks. The recommendation came in an email to Geneseo students on Apr. 8.  

According to the email, “Due to a slight increase in COVID cases at the college and the prevalence of the BA.2 Omicron subvariant in New York State, the College strongly encourages individuals to mask indoors, regardless of vaccination status, especially at large events and gatherings.” 

Geneseo Medical Director Dr. Steven Radi said that although the rise in cases is not as severe as previous surges have been, the rise indicates an increasing trend that needs to be addressed. 

“There have been, once again in the Northeastern states, a fairly significant rise in the last week or two about 64% increase. Now, these numbers aren't terribly high, but they surely seem to indicate a trend once again, most likely related to the BA.2 variant of Omicron which is now making up more than 90% of COVID-19 cases is the United States,” Radi said. 

Radi said that the increase in cases on campus was expected due to the recently lifted mask mandate and the prevalence of the BA.2 variant, and that the recommendation that students mask indoors was the 

He said, “I think [the rise in COVID cases] was something that was potentially anticipated. I don't think this is unexpected and when we when discuss these things in the Coronavirus Leadership Team, we throw out these possibilities. We surely want to always follow the science and the evidence and at the time, it really seemed like a reasonable time to say ‘hey, I think we can really get rid of the mandatory indoor mass mandates.’ But now we're seeing increasing rates; I believe last week we had 43 active student cases, which is a lot more than we've had in quite a while. So, it really seemed to be the thing to do to say ‘hey, let's follow the best science here. Let's make a strong recommendation for indoor masking because we know it helps and we know it works.’” 

Radi expressed hope that students follow the recommendation, especially when in large gatherings on and off campus. 

“I do really think that our students listen and do follow recommendations,” he said. “I think where we kind of fall off the curve a little bit is outside activities, social activities and such where, and obviously a lot of that is happening off-campus, people are making some very individual decisions regarding that. However, I think the majority of students really listened to our recommendations.” 

While Radi does not anticipate any further action will be taken regarding masking indoors, he said that he cannot rule out the possibility of reinstating a mask mandate on campus. 

“I can't say no to [the possibility of a reinstated mask mandate]. I believe that yesterday Columbia re-instituted their indoor mask mandate. They're seeing the same bump in Manhattan in New York City, and that could happen here if the trend continues to be higher. We obviously don't want to see that happen. I think if people are really, really prudent about what they're doing that maybe we can mitigate that on campus. We have a highly vaccinated community of students that are vaccinated and boosted and that affords us very significant protection, so I'm going to be optimistic that we won't be going back to that right now. But the possibility cannot be ruled out in these last several weeks,” Radi said. 

“I think our population knows what to do, and sometimes we have to shoot out a reminder to say what we're seeing so you know what to do to keep yourself safe. So, let's do that and hopefully it won't have to go any further here as far as any mandates are concerned,” he said.