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Masks will once again be required indoors in D.C. beginning Saturday, Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) ordered, in a reversal of recent policy driven by new federal guidelines that recommend indoor masking in areas where coronavirus transmission is high.
The new requirement, which Bowser announced Thursday, will apply to vaccinated and unvaccinated people alike over the age of 2.
For many months of the pandemic, D.C. had one of the strictest mask mandates in the nation, requiring masks both indoors and outdoors whenever one person came near another for more than a “fleeting” amount of time.
Rising virus rates in D.C., Alexandria have officials considering mask mandates anew
Some people are catching coronavirus after being vaccinated. Johns Hopkins University infectious disease expert Lisa Maragakis gives advice on how to stay safe. (John Farrell/The Washington Post)
Bowser stopped requiring masks in many settings for vaccinated people in May and all residents in June, though the city continued mandating masks on public transit and in schools and government buildings.
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This week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced a new approach, asking people in localities with more than 50 new cases per 100,000 residents per week — including the District, where case rates have risen sharply in recent weeks — to again wear masks indoors. Bowser said Thursday that she would require masking.
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She said she has the power to issue the requirement while the city remains in a state of emergency, though she allowed the broader public health emergency — which for months gave her the power to shut down businesses and other restrictions — to expire over the weekend.
Tracking coronavirus deaths, cases and vaccinations in D.C., Maryland and Virginia
While D.C.’s case rate has quadrupled recently, the new daily case rate, now about 8 per 100,000, is far lower than what it was during the worst of the pandemic. The highly contagious delta variant plaguing much of the country has been scarcely reported in the District, and as cases among vaccinated people are generally not severe, the city’s hospitals are not overwhelmed by covid patients.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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