School mask mandates in New Jersey and Delaware will be lifted next month, the governors of both states said on Feb. 7. The New Jersey mandate will be lifted on March 7, Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat, said in a statement. “Balancing public health with getting back to some semblance of normalcy is not easy. But we can responsibly take this step due to declining COVID numbers and growth in vaccinations,” Murphy said. Like many states, New Jersey saw an explosion in COVID-19 cases in late 2021 but the numbers have since dropped precipitously, from a peak of 33,459 on Jan. 7 to just 1,625 on Feb. 6. Hospitalizations attributed to COVID-19 have also gone down recently in the majority of states. The number of people vaccinated, meanwhile, has continued to grow. The vaccines offer reduced protection against the Omicron variant of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, which causes COVID-19, …