Face masks will be required at large outdoor events in Los Angeles County, the nation’s most populous, under a new order taking effect Friday as southern California sees a resurgence of cases of COVID-19.
The new mask requirement announced Tuesday by the L.A. County Department of Public Health will apply to outdoor “mega events” with 10,000 attendees or more, including concerts, sporting events and parades.
Each person in attendance must wear a face mask, regardless of whether they are vaccinated against COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, but can briefly remove it for eating or drinking.
Face masks are mandatory already in L.A. County on public transportation and in transportation hubs, schools, healthcare settings, jails, shelters, indoor public settings and public and private businesses.
By modifying existing health regulations, face masks will also soon be mandatory at mega events taking place at open-air venues including amphitheaters and baseball and football stadiums, for example.
Dr. Barbara Ferrer, L.A. County’s director of public health, said requiring universal masking at outdoor mega events was necessary to reduce the spread of COVID-19 and the more contagious Delta variant.
“The most sensible way to add protection is to please keep [your] mask on when in indoor public places or worksites and at outdoor mega events when not eating or drinking,” Dr. Ferrer said in a statement.
SoFi Stadium, the home of both the L.A. Rams and L.A. Chargers professional football teams, said that all guests attending either of their games this weekend must wear a mask when not eating or drinking.
L.A. County, which has roughly 10 million residents, has measured a growing number of new COVID-19 cases, hospitalization and deaths each day in the several months leading up to the new face mask rule.
More than a year into the coronavirus pandemic, L.A. and the rest of California “reopened” in mid-June by rolling back health and safety restrictions that were first imposed earlier on in the outbreak.
The number of daily new COVID-19 cases in L.A. County has gone from 108 on June 1, to 506 on July 1, to 3,045 on Aug. 1. The health department reported 2,907 new cases on Tuesday, up from 2,426 on Monday.
Health officials have relatedly measured a growing number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 in L.A. County as well. That number swelled from 259 on June 1, to 1,679 as of Tuesday this week.
Thirty new COVID-19 deaths were reported Tuesday in L.A. County, the most in nearly four months. The last time local officials measured 30 or more deaths in a day from COVID-19 in L.A. County was April 29.
More than 1.3 million cases of COVID-19 have been reported in L.A. County since the coronavirus pandemic started in early 2020. A total of 24,935 people there have died from the disease during that span.
The coronavirus is transmitted in respiratory droplets expelled when a person opens their mouth to eat, drink, cough, talk, sneeze or breathe, and face masks can significantly help to reduce their spread.
Vaccines have proven to be greatly effective at preventing severe illness and death from COVID-19. However, vaccinated individuals can still potentially contract the virus and then spread it to others.
While the coronavirus is most transmissible indoors, outdoor exposure can still potentially cause infection.
“In general, you do not need to wear a mask in outdoor settings,” the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says on its website.
However, the CDC adds: “In areas with high numbers of COVID-19 cases, consider wearing a mask in crowded outdoor settings and for activities with close contact with others who are not fully vaccinated.”
