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Maine is expected to adopt new U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance on mask-wearing indoors for vaccinated individuals as a resurgence of COVID-19 cases has kept the pandemic from receding.

Maine CDC director Dr. Nirav Shah told the Bangor City Council on Monday that masks are likely coming back.

We probably need to be prepared, even for fully vaccinated folks, for the time being, to go back to wearing masks in indoor settings, Shah told councilors, according to the Bangor Daily News.

The Maine CDC did not immediately respond to questions Tuesday about mask-wearing recommendations.

Meanwhile, state health officials reported 172 new cases of COVID-19 for the three-day period from Saturday through Monday, adding to an increasing level of new virus transmission. One additional death was reported Tuesday as well.

The U.S. CDC announced Tuesday that it was reversing its earlier guidance and recommending that vaccinated people resume wearing masks indoors in areas with substantial and high transmission, especially those who live with or are in close contact with immunocompromised individuals or unvaccinated people, including children under the age of 12.

Additionally, the CDC will recommend that teachers, staff, students and visitors to K-12 schools wear masks indoors regardless of vaccination status.

What impact the new guidelines will have is unclear.Since May, guidance has been that vaccinated individuals do not need masks because of the protection afforded by vaccines.The U.S. CDC has still recommended that unvaccinated people continue wearing masks in crowded public settings, but no one is enforcing that policy and masks have become increasingly scarce even as cases spike.

Maines new COVID-19 cases include cases for Saturday, Sunday and Monday, as the state no longer processes tests over the weekend. The new figure continues an upward trend. The seven-day daily case average, which has been rising steadily for about a month, now sits at 64 cases after bottoming out at about 14 cases on average at the beginning of the month.

Case counts are far greater than they were last summer, when people were more cautious about large gatherings and wore masks in many public settings.

The same trend is playing out across the country and is even worse in some areas where the highly transmissible delta variant has taken hold. The seven-day average in the U.S. is about 42,000 cases, up from 12,000 cases this time last month. Some states, such as Florida, are being especially hard hit.

Dr. James Jarvis, COVID-19 incident commander for Northern Light Health, said he thinks the updated mask guidance is prudent and could have some impact, even if its not a mandate.

I think there are people who have wanted to (wear masks) but have felt uncomfortable because no one else is, he said.

He said while the virus is still circulating widely, breakthrough infections in vaccinated people can happen.

Everyone who gets infected could be the source of a new variant, maybe even one that eludes our vaccinations, Jarvis said. This is how viruses work. Masks help to prevent the spread, weve known that.

Greg Dugal, director of government affairs for Hospitality Maine, which represents the states food and lodging industry, said without a mandate, though, he doesnt see much changing.

Everything that our businesses had to go through last year and earlier this year was under a state of emergency, he said. Without that mechanism, I think thats going to create some confusion. Recommendations are really gray areas.

Dugal said businesses arent equipped, and shouldnt be, to police mask wearing. The same is true, he said, of vaccination status.

Ive not been looking forward to this, he said. You knew something was going to happen.

Of the new cases reported Tuesday in Maine, 46 were in Cumberland County, which is also the county with the highest rate of vaccination. But Cumberland County also has the most people, so even though its vaccination rate is 72 percent, there are still 84,000 people who have yet to get their shots.

Since the pandemic began, there have been 70,076 confirmed or probable cases of COVID-19 and 898 deaths, according to data tracked by the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Hospitalizations which had been stable have started to creep back up as well. As of Tuesday there were 33 individuals in the hospital with COVID-19, an increase of eight just in the last week. Of those, 18 were in critical care.

Vaccinations, on the other hand, have slowed way down in Maine and across the country, although there are small signs demand might be increasing. In all, Maine has administered 807,540 final doses of COVID-19 vaccine, covering just over 60 percent of all residents and about 68 percent of eligible residents age 12 and older.

For the week ending Saturday, July 24, Maine averaged 1,299 shots per day, which is an increase from 1,164 shots per day on average the week prior.

Despite Maines high rate of vaccination rate overall, though, many parts of the state lag. While Cumberland County has vaccinated 72 percent of residents, nine counties have rates below 55 percent, including two Somerset and Piscataquis that still havent reached 50 percent.

The geographic disparities are even more stark in rural areas. Among those between the ages of 16-39, 70 percent of those in Cumberland County have been fully vaccinated, which is close to the overall rate. However, in five mostly rural counties Somerset, Piscataquis, Franklin, Washington and Oxford the rate among 16-39 year-olds is less than 40 percent.

Public health officials continue to stress the importance of vaccinations, even as hesitancy has hardened into hostility for some. The overwhelming majority of all new deaths and hospitalizations from COVID-19 have been among unvaccinated individuals.

Jarvis at Northern Light said he hopes the recent surge leads to more vaccinations. He didnt have current numbers available Tuesday but said nearly everyone who has been hospitalized in recent weeks has been unvaccinated.

Asked if hes frustrated about the direction the state and country are heading back toward, Jarvis said yes.

People always have the choice to heed advice, but when we see the spread of misinformation, that really frustrates people in public health, he said.

This story will be updated.

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Masking expected to return in Maine, as new COVID-19 cases increase - Press Herald