COVID-19 hospitalizations in New York have fallen 78% since the winter peak in early January, and 75% of all New Yorkers are fully vaccinated against the virus. 

As the pandemic eases, Gov. Kathy Hochul is still holding on to some restrictions to stop transmission of the virus, specifically a mask mandate for students. 

While politicians are at odds over the rule, federal health experts say it is too soon to take the masks off of children. 

"We're fighting against a burning desire among the country to get this over with," Chief Medical Adviser to the President and National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci said. "The best we can hope for is to get it down so low, that's when we can say, 'we have the virus in the community, but it's not disrupting our function.' And I believe we can get there."

”So to everybody who followed our guidelines — the businesses who complied with what we asked them to do, the people who got vaccinated and got boosted, the people who wore their mask when the numbers were that dangerously high — we have now the lowest case rate of any major state and any large state in America," Hochul said.

While Hochul says she is monitoring a combination of factors to determine when and how to lift the mask mandate in schools, some leaders on the local level say it's time for the state to change course. 

“If you can’t put a metric forward, I don’t believe you can justify the mandate," Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon said. 

McMahon sent a letter to the state requesting specific metrics on when to end the school mask mandate. More than 20 county districts joined the call. 

“This is a virus that’s going to be with us, so how do we live with this, how do we move forward? I think that’s what we’re trying to balance right now," McMahon said.

But for now, the governor is taking a wait-and-see approach, saying she will be watching COVID cases after February break to help make a decision.