Chicago City Wire

GOP gubernatorial candidate Sen. Darren Bailey is questioning Jewel-Osco’s recently renewed mask mandate.

“I am disappointed Jewel-Osco is reinstating its employee mask mandate. Workers should be able to make these health care decisions on their own. If they want to wear a mask – then wear it, but employees should not be forced to do this any longer,” Bailey said. “As a society, we have had our lives turned upside down because of our response to this virus. Grocery store employees had no choice but to go to work at the height of the pandemic. They confronted this virus on a daily basis, and they faced the original, much more deadly version of the virus. There is no reason to force these frontline workers to endure any more than they already have. I urge Jewel-Osco to reconsider this mandate and give their employees the freedom to make their own health care decisions.”

Illinois workers at Jewel-Osco – most of which are concentrated in Chicago and its suburbs – are compelled to belong to the United Food and Commercial Workers Union which has been a vociferous proponent of masking.

The union decried the CDC’s updated guidance on masking in May 2021, which noted those indoors no longer needed to wear the devices, according to Supermarket News.

Cloth masks have long been known to not provide protection against COVID-19, the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy reported.

A University of Illinois at Chicago study found that "cloth masks and face coverings are likely to have limited impact on lowering COVID-19 transmission, because they have minimal ability to prevent the emission of small particles and offer limited personal protection with respect to small particle inhalation.”

Jewel-Osco's return to masking comes as more scientific data emerges indicating countries that use a lot of masking have worse outcomes than countries that use fewer masking protocols.

For example, during the onset of the pandemic, Sweden avoided masking in favor of less strict pandemic efforts.

According to the World Health Organization, the country has one of the lowest COVID-19 death rates in the world, significantly surpassing western European countries that have instituted tight lockdown and masking protocols.

Masking protocols have also been debunked by other academic studies.

In April, a study of 35 European countries was published, showing that "countries with high levels of mask compliance did not perform better than those with low mask usage," according to cureus.com.

Bailey was ahead of the pack in fighting executive orders that led small businesses across the state to fail as the COVID-19 pandemic progressed.

He has noted a complete return to normalcy is a high priority, according to his website.