Biden officials divided on message over N95 masks for all

WASHINGTON — As Covid-19 cases have surged, top Biden administration officials have been divided over how strongly to encourage Americans to wear high-filtration masks such as N95 respirators, as they have come under increasing pressure from public health experts to urge people to switch to masks that offer better protection.

President Joe Biden, who for weeks has been wearing N95 masks in public, said Thursday that he was planning to make "high-quality masks" available to Americans for free, without elaborating.

As cases and hospitalizations have spiked due to the highly-contagious omicron variant, public health officials have criticized the administration for not doing more to encourage Americans to wear N95 or KN95 masks, which they said could significantly reduce the transmission compared to cloth masks.

But others, including CDC officials, have pushed back on the idea of a mass distribution of N95 masks, the person said.

Since the arrival of the omicron variant, Biden has increased his calls for people to wear masks indoors, but has stopped short of advising them to wear N95 masks, something that he, the vice president and top administration officials have been wearing publicly and around the halls of the White House for weeks.

”I know we all wish that we could finally be done with wearing masks, I get it," Biden said Thursday.

Biden administration officials have solicited advice in recent weeks from outside medical experts who have given a range of recommendations, including letting people use a new website the administration is developing for free at-home Covid tests to also request an N95 mask, one person who has been in contact with the administration said.

There has also been division outside the White House over how the benefit of N95 masks should be communicated and how far the administration should go to urge people to wear them, with some public health experts advocating for the masks to be shipped to every person in the country and others warning it would be a waste of resources.

Michael Osterholm, an infectious disease expert who advised the Biden transition, said he has been pushing the administration over the past year to strengthen their recommendations on masks.

He said he supports the idea of sending an N95 mask to every American, and that the CDC recommendations need to make clear the benefits of wearing an N95 mask over cloth or surgical masks.

Administration officials have also expressed concern that emphasizing the benefits of N95 masks and discouraging cloth masks could lead people to stop wearing masks altogether if they don’t like the fit of the N95 masks, an issue CDC Director Dr.

Another concern about more strongly urging N95 masks has been the cost, said a person who has been involved in conversations with the administration on the issue