DSA

In late 2021, Dr. Fauci stated that we would need to get below 10,000 COVID infections per day in order to reach some “degree of normality.” At the peak of the most recent wave in September 2025, more than two years after the Public Health Emergency was ended because the pandemic was “over,” there were an estimated 1.24 million new cases per day in the US based on wastewater surveillance. Using the CDC’s own estimate of Long COVID risk at one in five, that’s 248,000 Americans disabled by COVID per day.

This is not the “normal” we were promised. We’re experiencing a mass disabling event.

The CDC, a government agency which claims to “control disease,” has a long history of harm that includes withholding treatment from Black men with syphilis in the infamous Tuskegee experiment and mishandling and downplaying the AIDS crisis. Their current policies are causing even more preventable disability and death, because the CDC’s actual function is not to protect public health but to uphold capitalism. Right now, that means sending people to work and school while sick and infectious with COVID. The rich and powerful have access to high-end ventilation and filtration systems, nasal photodisinfection, sterilizing Far UV-C lights, AI-powered wearables that predict illness, COVID-sniffing dogs, routine PCR tests, and personal servants to limit their contact with the public. The rest of us don’t have any of that. Vaccines are one layer of defense, but post-Omicron COVID vaccines only provide about 50% protection against infection for four to six months, and the updated 2024 vaccine was only received by about 20% of the US population (data for 2025 is not yet available). For the working class, masks are simply the best tools we have.

MASKING IS WORKER SOLIDARITY

During the first year of the pandemic, labor, retail, and service workers died from COVID at a rate five times higher than those in higher socioeconomic positions. We’ve known since 2020 that those deaths are disproportionately Black, Hispanic, Indigenous, and disabled people. Even when the acute phase of the illness isn’t deadly, consider the consequences of a COVID infection for the average worker: one hospital stay can result in thousands of dollars of medical debt. Even if not hospitalized, missing a few days of work to recover can result in a loss of income, or the loss of a job. That can be catastrophic for people living paycheck to paycheck. Even a mild or asymptomatic case can trigger a chronic illness which takes away their ability to work entirely, potentially permanently. The same is true when a child is infected and a parent has to miss work to care for them. This isn’t hypothetical, it’s still evident at the population level in 2025. Every broken chain of transmission prevents a loss of income that would push working class people closer to eviction, homelessness, and death.

MASKING IS GLOBAL SOLIDARITY

Because of capitalist greed resulting in vaccine apartheid, the majority of Africans are still not vaccinated against COVID. Vaccination rates are also abysmally low for Palestinians living under occupation due to Israel restricting access; as of August 2022, “more Israelis had received a third dose of the vaccine than Palestinians who had received a first dose.” Since October 7th, 2023, millions of displaced Palestinians have been forced to shelter in crowded conditions, causing rapid spread of infectious diseases. COVID has become one of many instruments of colonization and genocide. Those of us living in the US have the incredible privilege of access to high quality masks such as KN95, KF94, and N95 respirators, life saving tools which are simple, easy to use, far more effective than cloth or surgical masks (even more so when worn by everyone), and relatively inexpensive. I believe we also have a responsibility to use them. Every broken chain of transmission is one less chance for the virus to evolve into the next variant that spreads around the world.

MASKING IS SOLIDARITY WITH DISABLED PEOPLE

People who are immunocompromised or high risk, or who already have Long COVID, haven’t been able to safely access any public space since widespread masking was largely dropped after vaccines became available. Advice from the CDC has been for those people to take on the entire burden of protecting themselves, with perfect precautions at all times without any help from their communities, leading to profound isolation. When we gather in large numbers, we’re responsible for mitigating the risk that spreads to the broader community when our members leave a meeting and go to work, school, grocery stores and doctors’ offices. With 1 in 35 people in New York State actively infectious as of September 29th, 2025, statistically the risk of someone having COVID in a room of 50 people is 76%. Just staying home when sick isn’t enough: more than half of COVID transmission comes from people who don’t have symptoms.

Additionally, if we want disabled people to be able to participate in our organization, as well as get the benefits of in person socialization over strictly online meetings, our meeting spaces must be accessible to them. Disabled people are not a monolith, and accessibility needs vary and often conflict. In the case of people who can’t mask for medical reasons, that’s all the more reason for everyone else to mask to protect them. In the case of people who would need others to unmask in order to hear better or lip read, there are other accommodations that could be made, such as interpreters, captionists, amplification, or communicating by text or in written form. If the goal is accessibility for all disabled people, the solution is not to unmask and put people at risk when alternatives are available.

EVERYONE IS VULNERABLE TO LONG COVID

At this point, we have five years’ worth of evidence that COVID damages the vascular system as well as almost every organ in the body, including the brain, heart, lungs, liver, kidney, and eyes. COVID can cause microclots, immune system dysregulation, erectile dysfunction, mitochondrial damage, autonomic dysfunction, and disruption of the blood-brain barrier. Messaging from public health institutions, government, and media makes it seem like “the vulnerable” are a small and insignificant minority, but the reality is that people with one or more conditions listed by the CDC as high risk for COVID make up 75% of the population. If you have veins, a heart, and a brain, you are at risk. A COVID infection can be disabling even if you’re vaccinated, even if you have a mild or asymptomatic case, even if you’ve been infected before. The risk of Long COVID is cumulative, meaning reinfections are just as likely to cause persistent symptoms as the initial infection, and anecdotally, most people I know are getting infected about once a year. There are currently no FDA approved treatments, and most people with the condition don’t receive disability benefits. According to the authors of an article on the immunology of Long COVID, “the oncoming burden of Long COVID faced by patients, health-care providers, governments and economies is so large as to be unfathomable.” Every broken chain of transmission prevents chronic illnesses which diminish our capacity for organizing and surviving under capitalism.

If there’s anything we should have learned from the pandemic, it’s that we’re all connected. When it comes to infectious disease, individual health is dependent on the health of the community; our personal decisions affect other people, and our struggles are linked. The act of masking is solidarity, accessibility, self preservation, and community care. When we say “we keep us safe,” we should mean it.

Visit maskbloc.org to find free masks near you.