San Francisco ‘more and more’ softening masks mandate for places of work
San Francisco’s Delta variant-induced summer wave of COVID-19 appears to be coming to an end as cases in the city decline sharply and hospital admissions begin to decline as well.
The city’s health officer, Dr. Susan Philip said Wednesday that San Francisco is weighing whether to drop its mandate on interior masks and is “increasingly” trying to soften some parts of the mandate before others. Specifically, health authorities are considering the provision that all employees – regardless of their vaccination status – must wear masks in offices. If the mandate for office masks is softened, it will likely be tied to vaccination status.
“Certainly the vaccination level will play a role in a workplace,” said Philip.
Philip stressed that health officials want to see a sustained downward slide in cases and hospitalizations before making changes to the order. The number of cases is declining rapidly (the seven-day average of new daily cases is 124, up from 309 on Aug. 2), but hospital stays, usually a delayed indicator, are declining more slowly.
However, Philip said health officials are considering slowly withdrawing the order, removing mask requirements in some indoor areas before others. She said the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the Pfizer vaccine was a major development for office space.
“We know that with this full approval, some companies – which are not required by the health ordinance, but only affect part of their business or office decisions – will decide to vaccinate their employees for human labor,” she said. “In making the decision the vaccination status at a specific workplace is taken into account. We’re not ready yet, so we’re just figuring out what that might look like, and that’s part of the information that will go into the deliberation “and planning what that might look like.”
No specific timetable was given, but Philip used the phrase “weeks to come” when discussing discussions that Bay Area health officials will have about a possible change to health regulations.
San Francisco has one of the highest vaccination rates in the country as 80% of eligible residents are fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Philip said it was impossible to predict whether, given the vaccination rate and immunity from previous infection in some unvaccinated residents, it is even possible in San Francisco to see a big surge again.
“I don’t think anyone can predict this with 100% certainty because it depends on a lot of unknown factors,” she said. “But what I can say is the best possible protection we can build against these unknown things that could happen is this high level of vaccination protection.”
She added that once children under the age of 12 can be vaccinated, decision-making about the restrictions is likely to change.
“As soon as we are all vaccinated, I think our conversations will shift to the fact that COVID is more of an endemic disease that we have to live with just as much as we do with the flu,” she said. “But right now, with so many people who are still unprotected despite our really good vaccination rates in those 12 and older, we need to think about these other measures as well.”
