Philadelphia is reversing course on the face-mask mandate imposed just days ago and rescinding it, citing improving numbers for hospitalizations and case counts, the Associated Press reported. The Board of Health voted on the matter on Thursday, according to the Philadelphia health department. It did not provide data to back up the decision but said more would be available Friday. The news comes as face masks have again become a hot-button issue in the U.S. with the Justice Department seeking to appeal a federal judge’s overturning of the federal mandate. The CDC says face masks are still needed to protect the public health.
COVID-19 cases are rising again across the U.S. after their steep decline early in the year, driven by the BA.2 variant, and two new subvariants that
appear to be even more infectious. The two, named BA.2.12 and BA.2.12.1, were highlighted by health officials in New York State last week. The U.S. is averaging 43,142 cases a day, according to a New York Times tracker, up 52% from two weeks ago. The country is averaging 15,069 hospitalizations a day, down 1% from two weeks ago, the lowest since the first weeks of the pandemic. The daily death toll has fallen below 400 to 376 on average.
On a global basis, total cases are now above 507.9 million. Total deaths are above 6.2 million, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University, with the U.S. still leading the way with 80.9 million cases and 990,679 deaths.
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