On Monday, American University announced that masks would be required in campus buildings, except if people are alone, in their rooms with only their roommates, or if they are eating or drinking.

In recent days, a handful of other universities have reimplemented similar measures, including Columbia, Georgetown, Johns Hopkins and Rice universities.

As the highly contagious omicron BA.2 subvariant of the virus has been spreading in the U.S., coronavirus cases nationwide have ticked up around 10% over the last week, reports Reuters.