Gov. Greg Abbott celebrated Texas Independence Day by announcing that Texans will no longer be required to wear face masks in public, and all businesses can re-open at full capacity starting next week. The governor chose a crowded restaurant in Lubbock as the venue for his announcement, and spoke to a mostly maskless and cheering audience, according a report in the Dallas Morning News.

The news was greeted with less enthusiasm by public officials, who said the restrictions are still necessary to control the spread of the coronavirus, which has already killed more than 42,500 Texans. While Gov. Abbott offered the growing vaccination rate and declining hospitalizations as justification for his decision, less than 7 percent of Texans of Texans had been fully vaccinated as of last weekend, in a state of 29 million.

Abbott rescinded most of the executive orders he has issued in the last year since the virus invaded this state’s borders. Texas’ mask mandate has been in effect, though, not always in evidence, since early last summer. With Abbott’s decision, it will become the most populous state in the country not to have a mask mandate. Thirty other states still have mandates in place.

The governor urged Texans to continue exercising “personal vigilance,” but added, “People and businesses don’t need the state telling them how to operate.” Abbott noted that there is nothing stopping businesses from requiring their employees or customers to wear masks.

He also responded to concerns voiced by some local leaders around the state, allowing county judges the option of imposing limited mitigation strategies in their county if COVID-related hospitalizations in any of the state’s 22 hospital regions rise above 15 percent of capacity for seven straight days. While granted some latitude, local authorities denied any ability to enforce those orders.

“Under no circumstance” may a county judge jail someone for not following their orders, Abbott said, nor can they impose penalties on anyone who opts not to wear a mask— or on businesses that do not mandate mask usage by customers or employees.

Before Abbott announced his decision this week, Superintendent Lynn Pulliam had been preparing to address the possibility of lifting the mask mandate on CISD campuses during the final six-weeks of school. The option was to have been part of a discussion during last night’s (Wednesday) District Site-Based Decision-Making Committee meeting, as part of a greater consideration of updated COVID protocols.

In a letter sent to CISD staff Tuesday, Dr. Pulliam wrote, “As you have probably heard, Gov. Abbott issued Executive Order GA-34 today, which goes into effect next Wednesday, March 10. Most notably, GA-34 eliminates COVID-19 operating limits for businesses [including schools] and rescinds the mask man date, among other things.”

“GA-34 states that public schools may operate under ‘minimum standard health protocols,’” Pulliam explained, adding that he expected to receive guidance and clarification from the Texas Education Agency (TEA) as to what the minimum health protocols for public schools would be.

On Wednesday afternoon, the TEA issued a statement, updating its public health guidance in response to GA-34. “Under this updated guidance, a public school system’s current practices on masks may continue unchanged,” the statement said. “Local school boards have full authority to determine their local mask policy.”

Additionally, the Department of State Health Services announced yesterday that educators and school support staff are eligible for vaccines effective immediately.

The school board will decide during its meeting on Wednesday, March 10, “if and how our operations will be impacted by the new executive orders,” Dr. Pulliam said. “Because of the low number of cases in the community, and no new active cases in the school system, we had already planned to discuss, and possibly amend, the CISD COVID protocols.”

Until the board takes formal action, he said, “We will continue to operate under our current COVID protocols.”

Dr. Pulliam was responding to the undeniably good news here in Hemphill County and Canadian ISD. For the fourth week in a row, there have been no new and no active COVID-19 cases for the last four weeks. Only three students and one staff member are currently in quarantine. The last positive case of COVID at CISD was reported on Jan. 29.

Fifty-nine CISD staff members have been fully-vaccinated with both doses of the Moderna vaccine, and an additional 28 had received first doses and were expected to receive the second shot on March 5, according to Dr. Pulliam’s Feb. 17 report to his board. Another 18 staff members will receive their first doses this month, having waited the required 90 days after testing positive for the virus. By the end of this month, Pulliam said, 72 percent of CISD staff should be vaccinated.

The same trend is evident in the test reports from the Hemphill County Hospital lab, which reported only seven new positive cases during the month of February, and has seen only one new positive test to date this month—in this case, a resident of Mesa View Senior Living. There were no active cases at Mesa View Assisted Living for the fifth consecutive week.

CORRECTION: The Hemphill County Hospital lab reported eight new positive cases during the month of February, not seven, as previously reported. In addition, the new positive test today this month was not a resident of Mesa View Senior Living. Rather, it was an unnamed Hemphill County resident. The only currently active case at Mesa View Senior Living is a staff member who was tested on February 24, and whose COVID-positive result was reported last week. As stated, there have been no active cases in residents of Mesa View Senior Living for five consecutive weeks now. Hemphill County Hospital District has suspended weekly testing of residents at Mesa View Assisted Living and Senior Living, and will only resume testing if a resident becomes symptomatic. The staff at those two facilities is still tested for COVID-19 on a weekly basis, and those results are reported weekly if any test result is positive. ---LEB

Hemphill County Hospital District has also taken an aggressive approach to vaccine distribution. Since December 24, 2020, the hospital has held several vaccine clinics in Canadian and Pampa, resulting in 900 fully-vaccinated residents in this community and the surrounding region.

A clinic is scheduled tomorrow (Thursday) to administer 100 more first doses, and another clinic will follow on Friday to give second doses to 300 who received their first doses a month ago.

In the first phase of vaccines, HCHD vaccinate the hospital and clinic staff, physicians, and other health care providers. CVS Pharmacy administered first- and second-round vaccines to the residents and staff at both Mesa View Assisted Living and Senior Living in January.

That allowed the hospital district to move to Phase 1B distribution sooner than anticipated, and the district has administered both doses to the majority of frontline essential workers and to residents 75 years and older.

Responding late yesterday to Governor Abbott’s announcement, Hemphill County Hospital officials said they have not relaxed their district-wide mask requirement, and plan no immediate changes to the COVID-19 protocols already in place. Any changes in those policies will be announced in next week’s Record.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Hemphill County Hospital reported yesterday that they are developing an alternative to the COVID Vaccine Hotline that has been promoted in social media and in this newspaper. Their goal is to move to a more efficient and effective online system. That information will be published here an online as soon as it is available.