Pasadena Public Health Director Ying-Ying Goh said Sunday that Pasadena is experiencing a COVD-19 surge caused by the newer BA.4 and BA.5 variants and that if Los Angeles County re-enters the high community level Pasadena “would consider requiring indoor masking.”
Currently the County is in the moderate community level but moving toward the high level, Goh said.
On Friday, the County Department of Public Health reported 6,416 new cases of COVID-19 and 18 additional deaths related to the coronavirus — the highest daily number of virus-related deaths since late March.
County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said Thursday that given the current rate of increase in hospitalizations, Los Angeles County is on pace to reach the “high” virus activity level this week, which could equate to another universal indoor mask-wearing mandate by the end of the month.
“When we move into the high community level,” said Pasadena’s Dr. Goh, “additional measures to curb Covid transmission will be warranted, and we would consider requiring indoor masking.”
Goh said Pasadena is “in a significant surge – without coming down from the last surge- because of the BA.4 and BA.5 variants.”
“Our confirmed case rates are extremely high (well above the CDC high transmission level, red) and underestimate the actual cases because [only] a small proportion of people with Covid are getting PCR tested,” Goh explained.
County-wide hospital numbers have been steadily rising in recent months, an increase health officials have attributed to renewed rapid spread of the virus thanks to the infectious BA.4 and BA.5 variants, which authorities say are highly contagious and capable of re-infecting previous patients.
Health officials have said many of those patients entered the hospital for other reasons before testing positive for COVID, but they still place an added burden on hospital staff as they require special infection-control measures. County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said Thursday roughly 40% of patients with the virus were admitted for COVID illness, while 60% were admitted for other reasons.
She also said that given the current rate of increase in hospitalizations, Los Angeles County is on pace to reach the “high” virus activity level this week, which could equate to another universal indoor mask-wearing mandate by the end of the month.
As of Thursday, the county’s admission rate was 8.4 per 100,000 residents. But given the rate of increase over the past two weeks, the county is on pace to reach 10 per 100,000 residents by next Thursday, Ferrer said in an online briefing. She stressed that the estimate is only a projection that could change dramatically based on admission numbers in the coming days.
If the county remains at that high level for two consecutive weeks, it will re-impose a mandatory indoor mask-wearing mandate. Under the current schedule, that would happen on July 29.
If that happens, the Pasadena Public Health department would likely follow suit.
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One thought on “As County Moves Towards High COVID-19 Level, Specter of Required Indoor Masking for Pasadena Returns”
Dr. Goh,
Before following LA county with another mask mandate, I wish you would take into consideration the City of Pasadena’s astonishing vaccination rate of 99.999%, no covid ICU patients currently in Huntington Hospital (only 19 normal bed covid patients) and the fact that there are according to CDC’s website 39 other counties in California in the HIGH tier that have not reinstated a mask mandate. People need to take responsibility for wearing the mask when they feel it’s needed (wearing a mask on an airplane is optional). BA.5 is milder, so mild that people who get it often get reinfected within a few weeks, see what happened to Dr. Fauci. I do not think we should attach our city to the voice of Barbara Ferrer and her $613,000 a year salary. She shouldn’t be the one making Pasadena join in being the only county in America with a mask mandate. We can do better. We are smarter than we were in the summer of 2020 and 2021, aren’t we?
Sincerely,
Dr. N