KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The CDC announced on Tuesday that fully vaccinated people can gather outdoors in small groups and dine outside without masks.
Along with the announcement, the agency posted a list of indoor and outdoor activities and the risk levels for both fully vaccinated and unvaccinated people.
"If you are fully vaccinated and want to attend a small, outdoor gathering with people who are vaccinated and unvaccinated, or dine at an outdoor restaurant with friends from multiple households, the science shows if you are vaccinated, you can do so safely unmasked," said CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky.
That science is something Dr. Anthony Fauci also touched on earlier in the week, when he hinted that the CDC guidance would change.
"The risk of infection outside is really minimal. If you're vaccinated and you're outside, it's even less," Dr. Fauci said.
An analysis published in the Journal of Infectious Diseases found the coronavirus was nearly 19 times more likely to be spread indoors compared to outdoors.
Still, not all outdoor activities are safe without a mask.
"We continue to recommend masking in crowded outdoor settings and venues such as packed stadiums and concerts where there is decreased ability to maintain physical distance and where many unvaccinated people may also be present," Dr. Walensky said.
For vaccinated people, masks are also still recommended for a lot of indoor activities, like visiting a hair salon or going to a museum.
That's because no vaccine is 100 percent effective.
More than 7,000 breakthrough COVID-19 infections have occurred in fully vaccinated people in the U.S. However, those infections tend to be more mild.
"The odds are you're not going to get hospitalized, you're not going to get as sick," Dr. Steven Stites of the University of Kansas Health System said. "It's going to be more like a small bump in the road as opposed to a major landmine."
In a press conference on Tuesday, President Joe Biden again encouraged more Americans to get the vaccine so they can do "more things more safely."
"For those who haven't gotten their vaccination yet, especially if they're younger or think they don't need it, this is another great reason to go get vaccinated now," he said.
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