Good morning. Today we’ll look at why Mayor Adams is not reinstating mask mandates despite a new Covid-19 surge — and why some health experts disagree with him. Also: If you’re ambivalent about going back to the office, imagine how your dog feels.
As the number of new Covid-19 cases reported each day in New York City topped 4,000 this week, the message the mayor seemed to be sending was: As you were. We got this.
He issued no public warnings. He did not reinstate a mask mandate for public indoor settings, even though a new alert system he approved in March recommends doing so at the risk level the city has now hit.
Even as city schools requested — but did not require — that older students resume wearing masks, Mr. Adams let stand his recent decision to let students go unvaccinated to senior proms.
Students can “celebrate all of their hard work with a prom and graduation, regardless of vaccination status,” he said in a news release, adding, “I encourage anyone who hasn’t yet gotten vaccinated to do so.”
Three main considerations are behind Mr. Adams’s approach, my colleague Emma G. Fitzsimmons reports: Hospitalizations and deaths have risen more slowly than in previous waves. New restrictions could cost him politically with a weary public. And he worries that mandates could hurt restaurants, tourism and the city’s economic comeback.
“If every variant that comes, we move into shutdown thoughts, we move into panicking, we’re not going to function as a city,” Mr. Adams said Wednesday.
Former city officials and many health experts disagree.
Health experts have argued that taking action when hospitals and health workers are overwhelmed or about to be — as Mr. Adams says he would — would be too late. Since most home tests are not counted in the city statistics, it is likely that there are already far more new daily cases than the official tally. As of Tuesday, more than 770 city residents were hospitalized with Covid.
Dr. Dave Chokshi, the health commissioner under Mayor Bill de Blasio and during Mr. Adams’s early months as mayor, said recently that the city was acting on “collective amnesia.”
“People would say, ‘Well, it’s only cases increasing, let’s see what happens to hospitalizations,’” he said. “It’s hard not to have your head explode when you feel the public, and in many cases, the political conversation, go in those circles. And you’re like, ‘Wow, when are we going to learn.’”
Mark Levine, the Manhattan borough president, said the city should be more nimble and “turn on and off protective measures when we hit a surge.”
There are mixed messages from City Hall. The health commissioner, Dr. Ashwin Vasan, issued an order on Monday strongly recommending medical-grade masks in offices, grocery stores, schools and other public indoor settings.
Mr. Adams has emphasized the benefits of antiviral medications like Paxlovid, which is free and available via home delivery to eligible city residents. His administration says it has distributed 35,000 antiviral treatments.
New Yorkers report mixed experiences with the medication hotline. For some, all goes smoothly, but others find the process, which requires a video smartphone consultation and ordering from an online pharmacy, confusing. Others say they were denied prescriptions despite meeting the criteria.
Weather
Expect a partly sunny day, with a slight chance of showers and temps in the low 70s. The evening is partly cloudy, with temps in the mid-60s.
ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKING
In effect until May 26 (Solemnity of the Ascension).
Day in court in Buffalo
Payton S. Gendron, the accused gunman in Saturday’s massacre at a supermarket in Buffalo, appeared in court on Thursday, as prosecutors announced that a grand jury had voted to indict him. Some relatives of the 10 people he is accused of killing looked on.
Mr. Gendron, 18, has pleaded not guilty. The judge adjourned proceedings until June 9.
Mr. Gendron faces life in prison if convicted, and he continues to be held without bail, the Erie County district attorney, John J. Flynn, said.
The latest New York news
Separation anxiety grows for New Yorkers and their pandemic puppies
In April 2020 — laughably early, as we now know — The Wall Street Journal published a point/counterpoint on whether or not it was time for office workers to resume their commutes.
The first piece was “America Needs To Get Back to Work.” The author — pictured, as usual, in a classic Journal black-and-white-dot portrait — was A Cat. The retort, by A Dog, was headlined “Why Not Work At Home Forever?”
Now, for many of New York’s dogs, the worst is happening.
More than 23 million American households added a cat or dog during the pandemic. Many of those animals have never known what it is like to be left alone all day. And while many cats may be thrilled with their new dominion, when it comes to dogs, it’s hard to tell who’s more anxious — them or their humans.
“We’ve had a lot of separation cases coming through,” Kate Senisi, the director of training at School for the Dogs in Manhattan’s East Village, told my colleague John Leland.
Mary Sheridan, a lawyer with a small East Village apartment, likened her return to work — leaving her pandemic puppy, Nala, behind for the first time — to the end of maternity leave with her son Theo, now 13.
“The panic you’d feel — Oh, my God, I have this baby, and I’m leaving the baby all day,” she said.
Undoubtedly, a warm dog nearby has eased the stress for many at-home workers.
Take Mishmish. Actually, don’t. He’s the best thing to happen to our family, the miniature poodle we said we would never get who arrived within weeks of the pandemic. He was the main thing the children missed when they went back to school.
But when I’m out reporting all day, my suspicion is that he mostly sleeps, storing up energy for a huge greeting. A neighbor who walked him the other day said he was perfectly happy to go out with a stranger. Maybe we just lucked into a dog who is the least neurotic member of the family.
Some dogs may pace, whine or chew things when left alone, trainers said.
But Raf Astor, who boards and walks dogs in the East Village, said the dogs he sees have adjusted just fine. It’s the people he’s worried about.
METROPOLITAN diary
Huge weight lifted
Dear Diary:
I was waiting with my children at a B103 stop on Fourth Avenue in Brooklyn. My daughter, who was 6 at the time, found a gold ring on the ground. Even I could tell that it wasn’t made of cheap plastic. Maybe an engagement ring?
“Someone lost their ring,” my daughter said.
“They probably need it back,” my son said.
Later that day, we returned to the bus stop and taped up a flier: “Found here: Lost gold ring; clear gem. Text me a description and we’ll return it to you.”
Two days later, a text arrived. The young woman who sent it said she had recently been dumped by her long-term boyfriend.
The ring was a gift from him, and in what she said was a moment of healthy self-awareness at the B103 stop, she had decided to drop it right there.
When she did, she said, she felt a huge weight lift. She didn’t want the ring back, she added, but it was kind of us to offer.
I read the text to my kids. A long conversation about love, marriage, heartbreak and moving on ensued.
“What should we do with the ring?” I asked.
In the end, we returned to the bus stop, where my daughter placed the ring under a chunk of concrete so that it could stay lost.
— Tate Hausman
Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.
