A New Jersey school nurse was suspended after questioning why students needed to wear masks.
Stafford Township school district nurse Erin Pein posted a YouTube video last week criticizing school mask mandates.
In the video, she argued masks are not effective at stopping the spread of COVID-19, and even if they were, they are unnecessary for children since students ages 18 and under rarely transmit the coronavirus.
“The masks, unfortunately, don’t prevent them from getting COVID. Because the viruses are so small, it can’t be stopped with a mask,” Pein explained.
She called mandatory masking “child abuse” and argued it would cause “anxiety and depression” by changing how children “learn how to be adults by recognizing faces and facial expressions.”
“Making these kids wear them for six or seven hours a day is awful,” she continued.
Pein, who has also refused to wear a mask on the job, said she was suspended from the school district after posting the video.
“Unfortunately, it is a personnel matter and I do not have the ability to comment or discuss the matter, nor can I discuss any of the information that Ms. Pein has already chosen to make public,” school board attorney Martin Buckley said in a statement when asked about the suspension.
Supporters of Pein plan to protest her suspension at the district’s next school board meeting, according to the Washington Examiner.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy signed an executive order last year mandating that schools require students to wear masks at all times while in school buildings, except while eating or if they have certain medical conditions.
New Jersey school officials even encouraged parents to force their children to “build up mask endurance” in preparation for the return to in-person learning.
“Please find reusable/washable face coverings that your child is comfortable wearing and gradually build up the amount of time they can tolerate wearing them,” one New Jersey superintendent wrote in an email to parents.
