Dropping mask mandates is a mistake, the head of the CDC said, after Iowa and Montana ruled that masks were no longer compulsory

• The director of the CDC on Sunday said it was a mistake for states to lift mask-wearing mandates.
• Iowa lifted compulsory mask-wearing in public on February 5, and Montana did the same Friday.
• Easing rules could put the US in a "difficult spot" with virus variants, Dr. Rochelle Walensky said.

The director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Sunday said it was a mistake for states to lift mask-wearing requirements, after Montana and Iowa lifted theirs.

Dr. Rochelle Walensky told "Face the Nation" that mask mandates should be lifted only when kids were safely back in school and communities were back to "some normal functioning."

Lifting mask mandates while more-infectious coronavirus variants were circulating could put the US in a bad spot, she said.

Gov. Kim Reynolds of Iowa lifted compulsory mask-wearing in public on February 5, and Gov. Greg Gianforte of Montana terminated the state's mask mandate Friday.

A recent CDC study reiterated the effectiveness of masks, finding that putting a cloth mask over a surgical one could dramatically reduce COVID-19 transmission.

Walensky also noted that 100,000 new COVID-19 cases were still being reported daily in the US - 2 1/2 times the number of cases in the summer - along with 1,500 to 3,500 daily deaths.

Michael Osterholm, an epidemiologist who advised President Joe Biden's transition team on the COVID-19 pandemic, warned February 1 of a "surge" of coronavirus cases in the US because of more infectious coronavirus variants, such as B.1.1.7, the variant first found in the UK, which is estimated to be 30% to 50% more contagious than the original virus.

More than 1,000 confirmed B.1.1.7 cases have been identified in 39 states, and about 4% of infections in the US are from B.1.1.7, Walensky said. The CDC predicted in January that the variant would become the most common coronavirus strain in the US by the end of March.

Walensky said normal mitigation strategies - such as mask-wearing - worked against the variant.

If these strategies were relaxed with more transmissible variants out there, the US could be in a "much more difficult spot," she said.

"Now is the time to not let up our guard," she added. "Now is the time to double down."