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Thursday, June 3, 2021
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
STATEMENT

“The COVID transition: Summer travel, social activities 

and masks

Over late night cups of tea during 

finals season, one of my housemates 
and I discussed our hopes and 
plans for the summer. She would 
be vacationing in Florida with her 
boyfriend and going on a trip home to 
Seattle. The talk of travel and social 
activities was exciting; however, 
there was a lingering uncertainty 
about just how “normal” life would 
be during the summer. When I 
described my hopes to be back in The 
Big House by next fall, my housemate 
admitted that she wasn’t sure when 
she would feel fully comfortable in 
crowds again, even though she is fully 
vaccinated.

Less than one month later, new 

public 
health 
guidelines 
have 

equipped us with more knowledge 
on what this summer will look like 
and how to navigate travel and social 
activities. On May 13, the Centers 
for Disease Control and Prevention 
announced that in most cases, fully 
vaccinated people no longer need to 
practice social distancing or mask-
wearing. For U-M students, there 
is a clashing mix of excitement and 
apprehension surrounding the shift 
in guidelines, particularly concerning 
what it means for returning to a sense 
of normalcy in time for summer 

vacation.

I talked to several students to hear 

their thoughts surrounding travel 
and social activities this summer. 
Is there a hesitance to go back to 
things like concerts and parties, as 
my housemate expressed in our 
conversation nearly a month ago? Or 
are students ready to get back into 
the world with full force? I expected 
to hear a mixture of enthusiasm 
and hope for post-COVID life, but 
I was also prepared to encounter 
some concerns or anxiety about the 
transition.

LSA 
senior 
Sophie 
Einbund 

described 
feeling 
immense 

excitement for her travel plans in the 
upcoming months, though she also 
expressed some uneasiness over the 
balance between having fun with 
being safe and responsible.

“I don’t get too nervous when it 

comes to traveling, but I guess in 
terms of traveling during COVID-19, 
it is somewhat nerve-wracking even 
though I’m vaccinated,” Einbund said 
during our Zoom conversation. “It is 
frustrating to wear a mask and hope 
that other people are vaccinated as 
well.”

In July, she plans on going to Miami 

with a friend, and in August her family 

is flying to Hawaii. She mentioned 
that Florida will most likely be a 
vacation hotspot, but she is hoping 
she will be protected from COVID-19 
after previously contracting the virus 
and more recently getting the vaccine. 

“I think I was pretty opposed to 

traveling when COVID started, but 
now that people … are vaccinated, 
or obviously more than prior stages 
when there were no vaccines, I 
definitely feel more comfortable 
traveling myself or for other people to 
travel,” Einbund said. 

Engineering junior Thomas Dokas 

also plans on traveling this summer. 
He will be visiting South Carolina 
with his family. 

“My 
entire 
family 
has 
been 

vaccinated, so we are mostly not 
concerned about it,” Dokas said. “But 
if any of us weren’t, then I think that 
would have become a big issue.”

 He and his family members 

are among the over 4 million 
Michiganders who have had at least 
the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. 
For Dokas, being vaccinated plays 
a huge role in terms of safety and 
comfort with traveling. 

“Personally, 
I’m 
not 
terribly 

concerned about (traveling) because 
I know how to keep myself safe from 

that sort of thing,” Dokas said. “I’ve 
been doing it for over a year now, but 
it’ll be interesting to see how other 
people start to behave.”

On the flip side, LSA freshman 

Maggie 
Sterling 
questioned 
the 

necessity of travel in general. While 
she will be traveling from Texas to 
Michigan when classes start in the 
fall, she has her reservations. 

“Personally, I’m not traveling for 

unnecessary reasons just because 
it still seems crazy, and planes have 
these enclosed spaces,” Sterling said. 

These feelings, she noted, account 

for her own actions and concerns and 
not her judgment of others. 

“I have known friends and family 

that 
have 
traveled 
during 
the 

pandemic with unnecessary travel, 
and I definitely found it hard for me 
to tell them not to because everyone 
makes the decisions that they feel 
(are) best for themselves,” Sterling 
said.

As of right now, the CDC still 

requires face coverings for public 
transportation, including airplanes. 
Still, there could be some hesitance 
over such excursions. 

Dr. Jon Zelner, assistant professor 

of epidemiology at the University of 
Michigan School of Public Health, 

talked to me about his recent 
experience traveling to New York. 
Dr. Zelner is vaccinated, but with 
two young children not yet able to get 
vaccinated, there was added risk to 
consider. 

“I drove up there by myself because 

I was not comfortable getting on 
a plane,” he said. “I would be fully 
masked, but the idea of sitting in an 
airplane with lots of people in close 
proximity, I just couldn’t handle it 
and it didn’t feel safe yet, even though 
this is one of these things where it’s 
probably just fine.” 

Dr. Zelner emphasized it could be 

a difficult transition for some people, 
one that may just take time.

“Certainly a year and a half ago 

(safety measures) seemed like bizarre 
things to do, like to sit six feet apart 
and keep our mouths covered, or if 
you have somebody at your house and 
keep the windows open in the dead of 
winter … you know, all these things 
felt kind of apocalyptic,” Dr. Zelner 
continued. “And it’s nice to let them 
go, but I think they become such a 
habit that to just focus back on our 
lives can be hard to do.”

BY ELIZABETH SCHRINER

Read more at michigandaily.com

Design by Erin Ruark

