--- title: The CDC's New Mask Guidance Is Motivating Vaccinations description: Nearly half of Americans who have recently been vaccinated, or plan to get vaccinated soon, are worried about being around unmasked people. canonical: https://time.com/6051290/cdc-vaccine-mask/ author: Jamie Ducharme article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2021-05-26T14:35:30.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-24T09:58:54.799Z article:section: Health og:title: The CDC's New Mask Guidance May Be Motivating People to Get Vaccinated og:description: But not for the reason you might think og:url: https://time.com/6051290/cdc-vaccine-mask/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2618335a3f6f8ba8/698a19e9db29874c30266932/cdc-mask-vaccine.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: Washington State Businesses Navigate New Rules On Mask-Wearing Indoors og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The CDC's New Mask Guidance May Be Motivating People to Get Vaccinated twitter:description: But not for the reason you might think twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2618335a3f6f8ba8/698a19e9db29874c30266932/cdc-mask-vaccine.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # The CDC's New Mask Guidance May Be Motivating People to Get Vaccinated—But Not for the Reason You Might Think > Sponsored content. 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Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators.  by [Jamie Ducharme](https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/)  ## Jamie Ducharme Ducharme is a contributor to TIME. May 26, 2021 2:35 PM UTC  A digital highway sign promotes COVID-19 vaccination on May 14, 2021 in Vancouver, Washington. A digital highway sign promotes COVID-19 vaccination on May 14, 2021 in Vancouver, Washington. Nathan Howard—Getty Images  by [Jamie Ducharme](https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/)  ## Jamie Ducharme Ducharme is a contributor to TIME. May 26, 2021 2:35 PM UTC As demand for vaccinations drops in the U.S., states are turning to increasingly dramatic measures—[Dinner with the governor](https://covid19.nj.gov/forms/dinner)! [Multi-million-dollar lotteries](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/states-are-introducing-vaccine-lotteries-some-multimillion-dollar-prizes-combat-n1268048)!—to convince people to get their shots. But perhaps the boldest incentive yet has come from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which [said](https://time.com/6049612/cdc-mask-guidance-mistake/) on May 13 that fully vaccinated people can go maskless, inside and out. The CDC is essentially dangling a carrot: if you get your shot, you can have your regular life back. Lots of experts have [questioned](https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/05/20/998265988/the-cdc-is-gambling-on-relaxed-mask-rules-to-get-more-people-vaccinated) whether that strategy will work, and some [argue](https://time.com/6049612/cdc-mask-guidance-mistake/?utm%5Fmedium=email&utm%5Fsource=sfmc&utm%5Fcampaign=newsletter+coronavirus+default+ac&utm%5Fcontent=+++20210521+++body&et%5Frid=101214629) it will backfire. After all, the policy is almost impossible to enforce. There’s little to stop unvaccinated people from going mask-free right alongside those who have had their shots, which could allow the virus to keep spreading. That’s a particular risk in indoor environments, like stores and offices. But a new TIME/Harris Poll [survey,](https://theharrispoll.com/cdc-unmasking-impact-may-2021/) conducted May 18-19 among 1,075 U.S. adults ages 18 and older, offers a slightly more optimistic view of the CDC’s gamble. The agency’s policy, Harris found, is motivating some Americans who are getting vaccinated—but not necessarily for the reason you’d think. Among respondents who were either vaccinated in the seven days ahead of Harris’ research or who said they planned to get vaccinated in the near future, 23% said that the CDC’s new mask policy encouraged them to get a shot. That’s a positive, if not massive, effect. But the data also reveal an arguably more interesting finding: among the same group, 41% said they got or plan to get vaccinated at least in part because they’re worried about being around maskless unvaccinated people. The CDC’s new policy probably isn’t the only driver of that feeling—more people are going maskless as case counts drop and states reopen regardless—but it likely played a role. Whether that was the agency’s intended result or not, it does seem that its mask policy is affecting people’s vaccination decisions. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/6051290/cdc-vaccine-mask/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/6051290/cdc-vaccine-mask/"},"headline":"The CDC's New Mask Guidance May Be Motivating People to Get Vaccinated—But Not for the Reason You Might Think","datePublished":"2021-05-26T14:35:30.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-24T09:58:54.799Z","description":"But not for the reason you might think","url":"https://time.com/6051290/cdc-vaccine-mask/","keywords":["COVID-19"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2618335a3f6f8ba8/698a19e9db29874c30266932/cdc-mask-vaccine.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jamie Ducharme","jobTitle":"Ducharme is a contributor to TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2618335a3f6f8ba8/698a19e9db29874c30266932/cdc-mask-vaccine.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Washington State Businesses Navigate New Rules On Mask-Wearing Indoors","caption":"A digital highway sign promotes COVID-19 vaccination on May 14, 2021 in Vancouver, Washington.","creditText":"Nathan Howard—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/covid-19/","name":"COVID-19"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/6051290/cdc-vaccine-mask/","name":"The CDC's New Mask Guidance May Be Motivating People to Get Vaccinated—But Not for the Reason You Might Think"}}]}] ```