San Francisco Lastly Says Sure, You Can Take Your Masks Off on June 15 (Besides on Muni)
Business owners across the city have waited patiently to find out if San Francisco mask rules and capacity limits would actually be lifted when they moved on on the 15th. And now we know.
Late on Tuesday, the Mayor of London Breed and Acting Health Officer Dr. Susan Philip announced during a webinar that starting June 15, the city will conform to state guidelines and lift capacity limits in bars, restaurants, gyms and other businesses. There have been several weeks of doubt as to whether SF would be stricter than the state as a whole, but no.
That probably also means that nightclubs will become nightclubs again and that we no longer have to perform the socially distant dance in the supermarket.
Except for very large events – defined as over 5,000 people indoors or over 10,000 people outdoors – no more masks will be needed anywhere unless a single company continues to need them.
However, you still need a mask on Muni trains and buses – these are the recommendations of the CDC, masks for local public transport until at least September. And, as we learned Wednesday morning, the Cal / OSHA board of directors is meeting to discuss a possible reversal of its guidelines on masks in workplaces where one or more employees are not vaccinated.
As reported by Eater, Breed urged the San Franciscans to be kind and patient with one another as we navigate this late transition to the pandemic – for you know there will be some people who will wear these masks indoors and outdoors all summer.
“We’re finally moving back to a certain level of normalcy,” Breed allegedly said. “Let me say that. It’s going to be a big change. The city comes to life, but not everyone moves at the same pace … so let’s remember that the last year has been tough for everyone. So have a little patience and a little grace. If you see someone wearing a mask and the rules say they don’t need to, just leave them alone. It is nobody’s business if they want to wear their mask. Maybe they feel so good. “
As SFist discussed yesterday, San Francisco is better off than most cities, even within California, when it comes to vaccination rates, and we could even achieve herd immunity in about three weeks. However, as Dr. UCSF’s Monica Gandhi says its whether or not infection rates will rise at all once all restrictions are lifted and people mingle again in public. Only the unvaccinated are really at risk, but in theory, when the city reaches levels that can be described as herd immunity, infected and unvaccinated people arriving from outside the city should not be able to trigger outbreaks, and the rate of new infections every day increases in SF should stay as low as it is now.
In the short term, this means that things like Stern Grove and Pride parties, which used to act cautiously and cap the number of tickets sold, can open the floodgates knowing the city won’t hold them back from next week.
But are everyone ready to be on a crowded dance floor again?
Photo courtesy of Audio
