Los Angeles County Director of Public Health Barbara Ferrer believes that if COVID-19 cases continue to rise, the county could move back into the high transmission level as soon as next week, which would mean the return of mandatory indoor masking in places like restaurants, bars and schools.
“We would be back to saying our health care system is getting stressed out, we need to slow down transmission,” Ferrer said in a Thursday press conference.
She also announced that the county was moving from low transmission levels to medium because cases and hospitalizations are rising. L.A. County has now reported more than 2,700 cases a day or 188 cases per 100,000 residents weekly.
Health officials said the county will move into high transmission levels if reporting grows to 200 cases per 100,000 residents weekly.