"It's still real, it's still deadly and it's attacking people who are not vaccinated," Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said of the pandemic. | Facebook
"It's still real, it's still deadly and it's attacking people who are not vaccinated," Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said of the pandemic. | Facebook
The city of Chicago has reinstituted its indoor mask mandate as COVID-19 infection rates continue to rise in the age of the delta variant.
“Following guidance from the CDC, based on our current local COVID-19 data, we're now recommending that everyone over 2 years old, regardless of vaccination status, wear masks in public indoor settings,” the Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) posted on Twitter. “Masking outdoors remains optional, where the risk of transmission is lower.”
As far back as in late July, CDPH, following updated guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and based on the city’s latest COVID- related data, CDPH moved to recommend that everyone over the age of 2, regardless of vaccination status, wear masks in public indoor settings.
The city recently moved past 200 new COVID-19 cases per day, squarely putting it in the CDC’s “substantial” category for local transmission.
“We are taking this step to prevent further spread of the very contagious delta variant and to protect public health,” Department of Public Health Commissioner Allison Arwady told chicago.gov. “This isn’t forever, but it is necessary to help decrease the risk for all Chicagoans right now.”
Also this month and with schools across the state set to resume in-person learning over the next several weeks, the governor moved to impose a statewide masking mandate for all students, teachers, staff and visitors.
The latest restrictions come just weeks after the city welcomed daily crowds well into the thousands for its annual Lollapalooza music festival in Grant Park. City officials also recently moved to add Florida, Louisiana and Nevada and the U.S. Virgin Islands to its travel advisory list, which already included Missouri and Arkansas.
"Knowing what we know about this virus and the delta variant, we wanted to sound the alarm today," Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot told ABC 7 News. "It's still real, it's still deadly and it's attacking people who are not vaccinated."
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