Majority of Americans will keep wearing masks on airplanes, public transportation, new poll finds
Travelers wear masks at Kennedy Airport on April 19, a day after a federal judge in Florida struck down the mask mandate for airports and other methods of public transportation. Credit: Getty Images / Spencer Platt
A majority of Americans will continue to wear face coverings when traveling by airplane or on public transportation, even after a federal judge struck down a national mask mandate for travelers, according to a new Long Island University poll.
The poll of 1,584 adults, taken April 21-22, found that 42% of Americans support ending the travel mask mandate while more than half believe the worst of the pandemic is in the rearview mirror.
Not surprisingly, the results broke down on political lines with nearly three-quarters of Republicans backing the end of the mandate compared to 41% of Independents and 21% of Democrats, pollsters with the Steven S. Hornstein Center for Policy, Polling and Analysis found.
Nearly half of Americans living in the Midwest and in the South support ending the mandate while just about a third of residents living on either coast back the idea, the poll found.
Meanwhile, 64% of respondents polled said they would still wear a mask when traveling by airplane and 63% said they would don a face covering before boarding a train, bus or ride sharing service. And more than 70% of those polled agreed that wearing a mask reduces the likelihood of contracting COVID. The poll's margin of error is plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
“The findings show that while support for the removal of mask mandates on planes is mixed, a majority of respondents said they will continue to wear a mask while flying or riding public transportation,” said Andy Person, director of the center in Brookville. “The poll also shows that roughly half of Americans think the worst of the pandemic is behind us. Poll results indicated that Americans’ political beliefs continue to be a driving factor behind their choices related to the coronavirus.”
In New York State, the end of the mandate has led to scattershot implementation.
Major airlines immediately lifted the mandate but all airports in the state, including Kennedy, LaGuardia and Long Island MacArthur, kept mandatory masking in place based on a previous order by the state Health Department. Likewise, federally run Amtrak lifted the mandate but the Long Island Rail Road, city subways and Nassau and Suffolk bus systems kept it in place to comply with the Health Department order.
Dr. Bruce Farber, chief of public health and epidemiology for Northwell Health, said it's "prudent" to continue wearing masks when traveling.
“Unfortunately, masks have become a right of personal freedom," Farber said. " … I think people riding the subways are more comfortable when they see people around them masked. It helps ridership and it reassures people. I personally think with our rates going up, not going down — even though people are not being hospitalized — this is not an enormous burden in this selective group of people, who are in tight quarters, often for long periods of time, some not very well ventilated, particularly buses and trains. ”
The LIU poll found Americans remain divided about the next steps in fighting the virus.
Just over half of respondents — 53% — believe the worst of the pandemic is over. That’s up from 23% who told LIU pollsters that the worst of the pandemic was over in September 2021.
Meanwhile, 53% of Americans polled said they often wore a mask to protect themselves from contracting COVID-19 and 62% said they remained concerned about someone in their family getting seriously ill from the virus.
Robert Brodsky is a breaking news reporter who has worked at Newsday since 2011. He is a Queens College and American University alum.
