Denver County will end its monthslong school and child care facility mask order after Feb. 25, the city’s public health department announced Wednesday morning.

The order will formally expire at midnight on Feb. 26, the city’s Department of Public Health and Environment said in a statement. Denver Public Schools will follow suit, its superintendent said Wednesday, and will not require face-coverings after the order expires. The change follows similar moves in Jefferson, Adams and Arapahoe counties, where school mask orders are ending amid a steady drop in COVID-19 cases. Denver ended its broader indoor mask order last week.

“With the current decline in severe cases and the high rates of immunity that we’re seeing, it is safe to lift the school mask mandate at this time,” Sterling McLaren, Denver’s chief medical officer, said in a statement.

Cases have dropped significantly in the metro and across the state over the past three weeks. The omicron wave, which ignited in mid-December and led to unprecedented case and positivity rates shortly after, has been subsiding since mid-January. Denver, for instance, was averaging just over 2,000 new cases per day on Jan. 10. By last week, that number had fallen to below 450.

Infections among children had been “among the highest” in the state during the omicron wave, Bob McDonald, the executive director of the city’s health department, said in an interview Wednesday. They’ve “dropped significantly” since, he continued. The order is being dropped after Feb. 25 to give schools and families enough time to prepare.

He said the declining case rates, availability of vaccines and masks, and incoming supply of pharmaceuticals have all changed the pandemic dynamic. In the city’s statement announcing the change, McDonald said ending the requirement “is the right thing for students” at this point. He said the city will “closely monitor the situation in schools and childcare facilities and act accordingly if any changes with COVID-19 take place.”

When Denver officials announced last week that the indoor mask order was ending, they said face-coverings in schools made sense because of state quarantine requirements. Unmasked students who were exposed to COVID-19 in schools, they said, would lead to more disruption. They indicated a change to state policy would help smooth the path for Denver to end masking in schools.

A spokeswoman for the agency told The Denver Gazette on Tuesday that the health department was working with the state on those rules. In its announcement Wednesday, the health department said it was “continuing to work with the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment on outbreak, quarantine and isolation guidance for schools. More information is expected in the next week.”

In an interview Wednesday morning, McDonald said the state was preparing to unveil new quarantine and isolation guidance for schools that will treat COVID-19 “much like other types of

illnesses.”

Just like businesses generally, school districts and individual child care facilities have the ability to institute their own face-covering requirements. Alex Marrero, DPS’ superintendent, said masks will be “strongly recommended” but not required in the district after Feb. 25. He wrote that he was “tremendously grateful to the entire DPS community for coming together” and following the guidelines.

In a statement posted online shortly after the health department announced the change, Tay Anderson — the vice president of DPS’ school board — said he had “deep concern” about ending the requirement and cited federal guidance recommending the continued use of masks indoors and in schools.

“Personally I believe that this decision disregards our immunocompromised students, educators, and families,” he wrote.

At one point, Anderson had floated the idea of making masks part of the DPS dress code, as at least one school district in Texas has done. He wrote in his Wednesday statement that he didn’t feel he had the votes to move forward with that proposal.

In his separate statement, Marrero wrote that the district “will continue to work closely with our health partners, and we will remain flexible and diligent as the COVID-19 situation continues to evolve.”

Masks have been among the most visible and contentious COVID-19 mitigation efforts, particularly when it comes to schools. Disagreements over their use in classrooms helped spur the dissolution of the Tri- County Health Department and is further fueling infighting in Douglas County School District. But their presence has been a near-constant in Denver as in-person learning resumed after the spring 2020 shutdowns.

The city ending its school mask requirement is another sign of public health officials’ optimism about the status of the pandemic. After warning that hospitals risked being overwhelmed in November, Denver officials said last week that the capital had pivoted into a new stage in its fight against COVID-19 going forward. In recent weeks, mask mandates have also ended in Arapahoe, Adams, Summit and Eagle counties. Larimer and Jefferson counties have both announced theirs will lift later this month.

“Coming out of Omicron, we’re now at a different phase of the pandemic,” Steven Federico, Denver Health’s director of pediatrics, said in a statement released by DPS. “The focus moving forward needs to be on vaccination — including boosters for teens and adults, as well staying home and getting tested when we’re sick. The lifting of this mandate does not mean that individuals should not or cannot mask.”

Cases have now fallen to a quarter of their omicron wave highs and are back below the delta wave’s fall peak. A team of Colorado researchers wrote late last month that roughly 80% of the state is likely to be immune to omicron by mid-February. Between high vaccination and infection rates, they wrote, Colorado should have a few months of relative calm, though a new variant emerging could throw that prediction into the wood chipper.

McDonald told The Denver Gazette that there’s “always the possibility” that county officials could require masks or other mitigation measures again. He noted the past major waves appear to follow a seasonal trajectory — meaning late fall and winter — and that will need to be monitored moving forward.

“But my sense,” he continued, “is that I do not think we’re going to see another variant that was like what we’ve seen before.”