Americans’ Views on Wearing Masks in the Time of the Coronavirus
Americans’ Views on Wearing Masks in the Time of the Coronavirus
COVID Collaborative and Hart Research conducted a nationally representative poll to assess the landscape on masking. The poll revealed that while 80 percent of those surveyed support local and state mask mandates and nearly the same percent support a federal mask mandate, only half of Americans report wearing a mask 90 percent of the time. Fifty-five percent of low-mask users report wearing a mask because it was required, even though they thought it was unnecessary.
These findings were used by Governor Asa Hutchinson (R - Arkansas) to publish an op-ed on Fox News subtitled “A Mask is the Uniform of a Responsible Citizen,” targeting the very populations that have the lowest mask usage. Former Governor Chris Christie (R - New Jersey) worked with COVID Collaborative to publish an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal entitled “I Should Have Worn a Mask,” written after he contracted COVID-19 and spent a week in the ICU following his attendance at a super-spreader event at the White House.