Ohio State will lift its state of emergency July 1 and the state of Ohio will lift its state of emergency Friday, Gov. Mike DeWine announced Thursday. Credit: Christian Harsa | Special Projects Director
Both the university and state of Ohio’s COVID-19 states of emergency will end within the next two weeks.
Ohio State’s state of emergency will no longer be in effect starting July 1, according to a Thursday update on the Safe and Healthy Buckeyes website. The university’s announcement comes the same day as Gov. Mike DeWine announced the state will remove its emergency declaration Friday.
University spokesperson Christopher Booker said in an email as Ohio State reactivates campus, the state of emergency is no longer needed. The university will continue to follow appropriate safety measures to ensure community safety.
Ohio State declared a university state of emergency March 22, 2020, following DeWine’s stay at home order earlier that day. The state of emergency allowed the university to use disaster leave — in which faculty, staff and graduate associates who could not work due to the pandemic would be paid by their college at a determined rate as long as their employment was sustained — and gave the university flexibility in making financial decisions over an extended period.
The removal of the state of emergency comes after the university lifted its mask mandate and social distancing guidelines for vaccinated individuals indoors on campus June 9.
DeWine lifted the state’s mask mandate and social distancing guidelines June 2.
While Ohio’s COVID-19 positivity rates decrease, the state continues to lose lives from the coronavirus, DeWine said at a press conference. The vaccine increases a person’s health safety, he said.
“There really is a dichotomy that’s really a fundamental difference between your safety if you’re vaccinated and your safety if you’re not vaccinated,” DeWine said. “On one hand, you’re safe and on the other hand, you’re not.”
An increase in COVID-19 cases in Ohio prompted the state of emergency signed March 9, 2020. The order gave the state the power to remove or adopt rules designed to alleviate the threat of COVID-19 and granted the Ohio Department of Health the power to create treatment guidelines for health care providers, institutions, private businesses and more.
“We’re certainly headed in the right direction, but that is being driven by the people who are vaccinated,” DeWine said.
