Fully vaccinated people in the US no longer need to wear face masks or socially distance in most indoor settings, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced on Thursday afternoon.

Americans who have had their final Covid-19 vaccine dose for at least two weeks will still need to wear masks in some situations, including in healthcare settings and while traveling, CDC Director Dr Rochelle Walensky said.

‘Anyone who is fully vaccinated can participate in indoor and outdoor activities, large or small, without wearing masks or social distancing,’ Walensky said during a press briefing.

‘If you are fully vaccinated, you can start doing things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic,’ Walensky continued. ‘We have all longed for this moment where we can get back to some sense of normalcy.’

Walensky said that face masks are still required while traveling on airplanes, trains and buses and at airports and transportation centers.

The decision was based on science and that fact that coronavirus cases in the US dropped by one-third in the past two weeks, Walensky said. It comes 16 days after the CDC announced that fully vaccinated Americans do not need to wear masks outdoors unless they are in a crowd with strangers.

Dr Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, said that fully vaccinated Americans can take the new guidance and make a personal decision of whether or not to wear masks indoors.

‘We know the risk is extremely low of getting (Covid-19) if you’re vaccinated but there’s people who don’t want to take that risk and there is nothing wrong with that and they shouldn’t be criticized,’ Fauci said.

As of Wednesday, more than 151million American adults, or 58.7%, had received at least one vaccine dose and about 116million adults, or 45.1%, were fully vaccinated, according CDC data.

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