The dispute between the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and Mark Meadows escalated Friday with no sign that the former Trump chief of staff complied with a deadline set by the panel to appear.

Meadows was not seen outside the D.C. federal building where witnesses have met with committee officials ahead of the 10 a.m. ET deadline.

The committee issued a warning to Meadows on Thursday night, saying his refusal to comply with the congressional subpoena “would force the Select Committee to consider invoking the contempt of Congress procedures.”

The chairman of the Jan. 6 panel, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., wrote to George Terwilliger, Meadows’ lawyer, to say, “There is no valid legal basis for Mr. Meadows’s continued resistance to the Select Committee’s subpoena.”

However, Terwilliger doubled down on the stance that the courts will have to resolve the dispute over executive privilege.

“Our correspondence over the last few weeks shows a sharp legal dispute with the committee. The issues concern whether Mr. Meadows can be compelled to testify and whether, even if he could, that he could be forced to answer questions that involve privileged communications,” Terwilliger said. “Legal disputes are appropriately resolved by courts. It would be irresponsible for Mr. Meadows to prematurely resolve that dispute by voluntarily waiving privileges that are at the heart of those legal issues.”

Terwilliger’s office did not immediately respond to questions confirming Meadows would not meet with the committee. He did issue a statement Thursday saying Meadows, who served in the House from 2013 to 2020, would not be able to comply.

Former President Donald Trump has signaled to Meadows and other former advisers and allies that executive privilege could also shield them from cooperating with the investigation. However, the legal shield largely rests with the current president. It’s the subject of new litigation between Trump and the committee now before an appellate court.

Of the 35 subpoenas issued so far, only one witness, former Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark, has appeared before the panel — but he was there to assert that privilege prevented him from answering questions. Another, former strategist Steve Bannon, was referred for a criminal contempt charge to the Justice Department, which could take additional steps to prosecute the matter.

Another wave of COVID-19 is sweeping across Europe, setting new records in some countries and prompting governments to impose new lockdowns to contain the spread of the virus.

Records for daily infections have been shattered in recent days in Germany, the Netherlands and Austria. While deaths from COVID-19 are way down from last year in many European countries, Russia — with barely a third of its population vaccinated — has seen a steady two-month surge and now leads the world in total coronavirus deaths for the first time since the start of the pandemic.

The World Health Organization’s COVID-19 report for the week ending Nov. 7 showed that Europe, including Russia, was the only region with a rise in deaths from the virus, up 10%. Overall, new coronavirus cases were on the decline in most of the world, but were up 7% in Europe and 3% in Africa.

Last week, the WHO’s director for Europe, Dr. Hans Kluge, said the region “is back at the epicenter of the pandemic — where we were one year ago.”

A virologist at Warwick Medical School in the U.K., Lawrence Young, told Reuters that the latest surge is yet another hard lesson for Europe. “If there’s one thing to learn from this it’s not to take your eye off the ball,” he said.

Vaccine hesitancy is a factor

Vaccine hesitancy, waning immunity among the already inoculated and relaxed restrictions are all considered factors in the new wave, according to Reuters.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has blamed the surge in new cases and deaths in there squarely on hesitancy, saying he can’t understand why Russians are reluctant to get the country’s Sputnik V vaccine.

In Germany, where cases on Thursday surged to a new record of more than 50,000, the country’s health minister, Jens Spahn, has said his country must do “everything necessary” to break the latest wave of the disease, Deutsche Welle reported.

“The situation is serious and I recommend that everyone takes it as such,” he said. Spahn and the head of Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases, Lothar Wieler, warned that intensive care units across the country were under severe strain from COVID-19 patients, particularly in the states of Saxony, Thuringia and Bavaria.

Spahn said free COVID-19 tests will be offered again starting Saturday.

Olaf Scholz, likely to succeed Angela Merkel as Germany’s next chancellor, has called on people either to be vaccinated, recovered or have negative tests to go to work and for stricter rules to enter restaurants and cinemas.

Nearly a third of Germany’s population is not yet fully vaccinated, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

Countries with high vaccine rates and strict mandates have generally fared better

By contrast, Portugal and Spain — where new cases have been minimal — top the European vaccination statistics, with rates in excess of 80%. Infections are also low in France, which has kept restrictions in place since summer, including a requirement to show a vaccine passport to do nearly everything.

Austria — which has a vaccination rate similar to Germany’s and has also posted record infections in the past week — appears to be days away from imposing a lockdown for anyone who is not fully inoculated.

Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg has called a national lockdown for the unvaccinated “probably inevitable,” adding that two-thirds of the population should not have to suffer because the other third refused to be vaccinated.

If the federal government approves, Upper Austria will impose restrictions on the unvaccinated beginning Monday. Salzburg is considering similar measures.

Schallenberg said the unvaccinated face an “uncomfortable” winter and Christmas.

In the Netherlands, a three-week partial lockdown is expected to be announced soon, Reuters reported. It will see bars and restaurants close early and sporting events held without audiences.

Denmark, which has also seen a recent upswing in cases, this week ordered its people to present a pass in the form of a smartphone app when they enter bars, restaurants and other public places. It is also considering fast-track legislation to require a digital “corona pass” for employers, according to Reuters.

While the United Kingdom saw a similar increase in cases last month, there are signs of a leveling off since then.

When can kids safely take off their masks in school? About three-fourths of the nation’s largest districts required masks at the start of the school year. Recently the calls by some parents to unmask children have grown louder, especially now that there is a COVID-19 vaccine available with emergency authorization for children as young as 5 years old.

The country is still in a pandemic that’s killing more than 1,000 Americans every day. And a body of evidence shows masking, in combination with other safety measures, effectively cuts COVID-19 transmission in K-12 schools. Masks are cheaper than renovating school buildings to improve ventilation or create outdoor learning spaces, and they’re (still) easier to get ahold of than COVID tests, which can also be used to prevent transmission.

On the other hand, masking has continued, in many cases, into a third school semester. Several months after most adults have been eligible for vaccines, tens of millions of children are spending school days with the bottom half of their faces swathed in either fabric or, in the case of surgical masks, a substance called “melt-blown polypropylene.” If they have a long commute, they could be masking for 10 or more hours a day; in some districts, masks are required even outside. Parents are concerned about social development, language learning, skin irritation and mental health.

NPR posed the question of when kids can safely take their masks off in school to scientists and policy leaders in different parts of the country, and found a range of nuanced positions and timelines.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

When can kids take off their masks? Not now.

In a statement to NPR, a spokesperson said, “CDC continues to recommend universal indoor masking for all teachers, staff, students, and visitors to K-12 schools, regardless of vaccination status or community transmission levels. At this time, there are no changes, however, as the science changes, we will update our guidance as needed.” CDC director Rochelle Walensky has backed keeping masks on in schools “as we head into these winter months.”

Massachusetts State Department of Elementary and Secondary Education

When? Immediately — with enough vaccinations.

How? A school must demonstrate a vaccination rate of 80 percent or more including both staff and students. The decision can be made “by local school and district leaders in consultation with local health officials.” Schools must collect proof of vaccination of everyone from administrative assistants to after-school staff. Unvaccinated people must keep masking.

Joseph Allen, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

When? Jan. 1, 2022, once younger children have a chance to get vaccinated.

How? Allen, whose expertise is healthy buildings, is not in favor of a vaccine threshold for unmasking students, given the low risk of COVID to children. He thinks schools should mandate vaccines for adults in school buildings, hold vaccination clinics onsite and provide education to encourage vaccines for kids, and use rapid antigen testing, ventilation and air filtration to lower risk even further. “I’ve been a big proponent of mask wearing for a long time, for over a year, but at this point in the pandemic, it no longer makes sense to me,” he tells NPR. “If we don’t offer paths to removing masks at this point in a pandemic, when risks are low and the tools for protection are there — the vaccine specifically — then we lose trust.”

Danny Benjamin, distinguished professor of pediatrics at Duke University, co-chair of the ABC Collaborative, which has done some of the largest studies showing the efficacy of universal masking in schools

When? January 2022, once younger children have ample chance to get vaccinated.

How? Benjamin would prefer that 100% of adults in the building are vaccinated or masked, and at least 70% of the children are vaccinated. At “70 to 80 percent, there’s a good chance you’re going to be successful.” And, because risk tolerance varies by district, he says, some districts might go mask-free with as few as half the children vaccinated — if they can accept more COVID-19 transmission as a result.

Amy Falk, pediatrician, Wisconsin Rapids, Wis.

When? “In my heart of hearts,” not for a while, but realistically, once children’s vaccines have been available for at least several weeks.

“My big holdout is getting every kid protected who wants to be protected. And that, you know, whatever happens after that, I guess everyone’s made their choice with it.”

Falk is lead author of a widely cited study showing that 90% mask compliance cut COVID-19 transmission within several schools in Wisconsin last fall, even when the spread in the community was high.

Vaccination rates in her community are low, around 50% for adults and even lower for teenagers, and she doesn’t expect much better for her younger patients. Opposition to mask mandates, meanwhile, has grown intense. Falk, who offers medical advice to her local school district, has been personally afraid to attend school board meetings since the May 2021 meeting, which she describes as “a very unsafe situation. There was a mass of anti-masking parents and some students. They were heckling us. They were not letting us leave. It was very, very heartbreaking.”

Public pressure led to the mask mandate in high schools being lifted this fall, which led in turn, she said, to “massive spread. It was unreal.” The board reinstated masking after two weeks. Dr. Falk wishes for continued masking, but, she says, “I actually don’t know if I think, at a state level, they could pull it off.”

Ali Mokdad, Professor of Global Health at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington

When? Let’s not even talk about it until the spring.

Mokdad sees signs of a coming winter COVID-19 surge and of waning immunity from adult vaccination. He implores, “We should not celebrate prematurely. We should be very wise about what’s happening right now. We’re talking about our children. We’re talking about our future.”

Jeanne Noble, Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, and director of COVID response for the UCSF Emergency Department

When? Dec. 28th in the Bay Area, eight weeks after the FDA’s emergency authorization of the vaccine for 5-11 year olds.

How? Noble’s recommendation is for schools to follow the metrics the Bay Area has set for unmasking adults in public spaces: low community transmission, low and stable COVID-19 hospitalizations, and high rates of vaccination — currently at 80% of San Francisco residents over 5 years old.

Like Dr. Benjamin and the state of Massachusetts, Dr. Noble thinks that unmasking once schools reach a threshold of 70 – 80% vaccination rates for students would be fine, even conservative. But she says going by community metrics is preferable because it’s simpler and more consistent. Dr. Noble is one of the authors of a petition signed by 150 Bay Area medical professionals, asking the state of California to create a clear masking off-ramp for schools.

“People are tired of this,” Dr. Noble says. “There’s a sense, I think, in a child’s life, particularly, that things are never going to change.” She says that parents need to be able to give kids hope by telling them that a day is coming when they will be able to play at school with their friends without masks on. ​​

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf (D)

When? Jan. 1, 2022

On Nov. 9, Wolf announced the statewide K-12 mask mandate will lift on Jan. 1. He’s not tying it to any requirements around student vaccination but is leaving the decision to local jurisdictions.

Outgoing New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio:

When? Not yet. The mayor, who oversees the country’s largest school district, said at a news conference that the mandate would stay in place “out of an abundance of caution.”

Incoming New York City Mayor Eric Adams:

When? He told CNN he “looks forward to it … if we can find a safe way to do it.”