The order will also require masks at all indoor public transportation hubs, including airports and bus terminals.
Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said Thursday that the order is based on the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s view that wearing masks in traffic remains an essential step. to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
“They are experts,” Ferrer told reporters during an online briefing. “They made a determination that, at this time, having that requirement in place is necessary for the health of the public, and that resonates with us.”
At the urging of the CDC, the US Department of Justice on Wednesday appealed a ruling earlier this week by a federal judge in Florida that struck down a US government rule requiring the wearing of masks in public transport, especially on board planes.
US District Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle ruled that the CDC had exceeded its authority by issuing the mask mandate on transportation systems. But on Wednesday, the CDC released a statement saying they continue to believe that requiring masks in indoor transportation settings “remains necessary for public health.”
“The CDC will continue to monitor public health conditions to determine if such an order remains necessary,” according to a statement from the agency. “CDC believes this is a legal order, within CDC’s legal authority to protect public health.”
In response to Mizelle’s ruling on Monday, public transportation agencies across Los Angeles County announced that masks would be optional, including aboard Metrolink commuter trains and on Transportation Authority buses and rail lines. Los Angeles County Metropolitan. Los Angeles International Airport and Hollywood Burbank Airport also announced that masks were optional.
Ferrer said the county’s renewed order, which goes into effect at 12:01 a.m. Friday, will reinstate mask orders in all of those settings. The rule will not apply to people aboard aircraft, which are outside of county jurisdiction.
She said she feels “very, very sorry” that the county’s new order will likely create confusion among residents who feel a sense of “whiplash” due to rapidly changing rules. But he noted that the CDC never changed its recommendations on wearing masks on public transportation and said the Florida court’s ruling was made by “a federal judge with little public health experience” who questioned the CDC’s authority.
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Ferrer said public transportation settings can often be crowded, putting people in cramped environments with poor ventilation, conditions that can stimulate the spread of the virus.
He stressed that the county is still seeing “a lot of transmission” of COVID-19, and the infectious subvariant BA.2 of the virus continues to spread, now accounting for 84% of all local cases undergoing special testing to identify variants. . A pair of BA.2-derived “sub-lineages” have now also been identified, one of which has already been linked to a “significant spread” of cases in parts of New York.
While BA.2 is being blamed for the rising number of cases, those cases have not yet led to a spike in hospitalizations due to the virus. In fact, hospitalizations have continued their downward trend. But Ferrer said that doesn’t lessen the risk of new and potentially more dangerous variants of the virus developing as it circulates.
The virus “is still equated with a major illness for some people,” he said. “It can still cause, even for people who experience mild illness when they first get infected, it can still cause a good percentage of people with ‘long-term COVID.'”
Throughout the pandemic, Los Angeles County has often imposed stricter COVID mandates than those required by the state and federal government. It was one of the first jurisdictions to impose widespread indoor mask mandates, and it maintained mask requirements for large-scale outdoor events, even as similar restrictions were eased elsewhere.
The county reported another 2,123 infections Thursday. Ferrer said the seven-day daily average of new cases in the county is now 1,261, up from 1,017 the previous week. The average daily rate of people testing positive for the virus hovered around 2%, one of its highest levels since late February.
Another 13 COVID-related deaths were reported Thursday.
According to state figures, there were 224 COVID-positive patients in county hospitals as of Thursday, up from 230 on Wednesday. Of those patients, 22 were being treated in intensive care, up from 28 the day before.
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