The state will be able to drop its Safe Travels program in March, with mask mandates to follow, Lt. Gov. Josh Green said Monday.
During a livestreamed interview, Green said that the continuing decrease in new daily COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations after the omicron surge means Hawaii soon will be able to safely drop many of its pandemic measures.
On Monday, 498 new COVID cases were reported statewide, 86 of which were on Hawaii Island. Green said 170 people statewide were hospitalized with COVID, a 52% decline from the state’s peak of 353 in January.
“This means that we will soon be able to get back to our normal lives much more than we have been for a long time,” Green said. “What does that specifically mean? That means that, sometime in March, we should be able to begin to move away from Safe Travels restrictions, and the last thing that will likely go will be the mask mandates.”
Green said he predicts that there will be fewer than 100 COVID patients in the hospital statewide in the next seven to 10 days. If the state can maintain that number for a week straight or more, it can safely begin to drop programs and restrictions, he said.
Other states have begun dropping mask mandates already, Green said, but he added that state health officials have said that Hawaii’s mandate likely will be the last COVID measure to end.
He estimated that, if hospitalizations decrease as predicted, Gov. David Ige could announce an end to mask mandates around the beginning of April.
Meanwhile, Green said he is not highly concerned about BA.2, a new omicron subvariant, which is even more transmissible than omicron.
“There will be variants for years,” Green said. “I don’t think even the most conservative individuals are suggesting … that we would stay in lockdown or keep rules like Safe Travels in place for the next two, three, four years.”
Green also said that the state’s federal funding for COVID mitigation will run out around April, and National Guard personnel deployed to help manage the pandemic will be redeployed elsewhere in mid-March. Without that infrastructure, and with BA.2 being less severe than omicron, Green said that continued restrictions will not be feasible or necessary.
Email Michael Brestovansky at mbrestovansky@hawaiitribune-herald.com.