Health officials say Los Angeles County, home to 10 million residents, could reinstate the indoor mask mandate on July 29.
Doctors say omicron BA.5 subvariant is causing more severe COVID infections for many, including reinfections with "more painful" symptoms.
White House COVID-19 coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha appeared on morning TV on Wednesday urging booster shots and renewed vigilance. Yet Mokdad said federal health officials need to push harder on masks indoors, early detection and prompt antiviral treatment.The administration's challenge, in the view of the White House, is not their messaging, but people's willingness to hear it - due to pandemic fatigue and the politicization of the virus response.
For most of the pandemic, Los Angeles County has required masks in some indoor spaces, including health care facilities, Metro trains and buses, airports, jails and homeless shelters. The new mandate would expand the requirement to all indoor public spaces, including shared offices, manufacturing facilities, warehouses, retail stores, restaurants and bars, theaters and schools.
Fayette said she was exhausted by shifting regulations and dubious another mandate would be followed by most residents."I just think people are over it, over all the rules," she said. The seven-day average for daily deaths in the U.S. rose 26% over the past two weeks to 489 on July 12. The coronavirus is not killing nearly as many as it was last fall and winter, and experts do not expect death to reach those levels again soon.
Instead, simple, proven precautions are not being taken. Vaccinations, including booster shots for those eligible, lower the risk of hospitalization and death - even against the latest variants. But less than half of all eligible U.S. adults have gotten a single booster shot, and only about 1 in 4 Americans age 50 and older who are eligible for a second booster have received one.
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