First Major U.S. City To Reimpose Mask Mandate Amid Latest Covid Surge

Topline

Philadelphia will reimpose its indoor mask mandate on April 18, the city’s health commissioner announced Monday, the first major city to put its mandate back in effect in response to rising Covid-19 cases linked to the highly transmissible omicron BA.2 subvariant.

People wearing face masks walk through Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Key Facts

Masks will be required in all public indoor places, and Health Commissioner Dr. Cheryl Bettigole said the city will give businesses a one-week “education period” before the mandate starts being enforced next week.

Philadelphia went into a higher tier for its Covid-19 response Monday in light of higher Covid-19 cases, which triggered the mask mandate, going from its “all clear” level—meaning there are less than 100 new cases per day on average—to the “mask precautions” level.

Bettigole stressed during a briefing there isn’t “any reason to panic” and residents should still go about their normal activities, but said the mask mandate was being reimposed as a cautionary measure to “get ahead” of the pandemic before hospitalizations and deaths can rise.

The health commissioner said she “suspect[s]” the current Covid-19 surge will be “smaller” than the initial omicron variant wave over the winter, but said “if we wait to find out and put our masks back on, we will have lost our chance to stop the wave.”

Crucial Quote

“If we mask up now and find that hospitalizations don’t increase in the U.S. in response to this variant…then great. We can take our masks off with a sense of relief,” Bettigole said. “But if we fail to act now, knowing that every previous wave of infections has been followed by a wave of hospitalizations and then a wave of deaths, it will be too late for many of our residents.”

Big Number

867. That’s the two-week average of weekly new Covid-19 cases in Philadelphia as of April 10, according to the city’s health department, which is up from an average of 440 cases in mid-March.

Chief Critic

The policy lab at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia had opposed the city reimposing its mask mandate, tweeting on April 8 that it “advises against required masking given that hospital capacity is good” and that its experts expect the rise in cases to die down by the end of April. (Asked about the hospital’s comments, Bettigole said Monday hospital capacity had not been the only factor that went into the city’s decision to require masks again.)

Key Background

Mask mandates were lifted across the country in recent months as cases plummeted following the initial omicron variant surge, and polling shows fewer Americans are regularly masking up. As areas like Philadelphia, New York City and Washington, D.C., see cases rise again and the highly transmissible omicron BA.2 subvariant becomes the dominant coronavirus strain nationwide, however, the question of whether to require masks again has returned. Multiple universities had already reimposed mask mandates in recent days, and White House Covid-19 coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha suggested Monday the federal government may choose to keep the federal mask mandate for planes and public transportation in place after it expires on April 18.