COVID cases are up slightly in WA. Will mask mandates come back?
It鈥檚 been about a month since Washington state . But a recent slight rise in infections raises a pressing question: At what point could those restrictions return?
Some sites, like the city of Philadelphia and several colleges, are announcing a return to indoor mask mandates as COVID-19 cases creep back up.
But our state isn鈥檛 quite there yet, according to Washington health officials and Gov. Jay Inslee鈥檚 office.
Infections have stayed relatively low in Washington since an omicron-fueled surge swept through this past winter, though data showing a small increase has emerged over the last few weeks, according to the . At the end of March, DOH reported a seven-day average of 535 daily cases, compared to 440 daily cases 10 days prior.
Still, the daily average is far from mid-January levels, when the state recorded an average of about 19,700 infections and 300 hospitalizations per day.
Could an indoor masking requirement make a comeback?
Unlike other parts of the country, there鈥檚 no specific threshold for reinstating masking requirements in Washington, said Mike Faulk, an Inslee spokesperson, on Tuesday.
鈥淭he governor has always said that the stress COVID puts on our health system is the biggest concern,鈥 Faulk wrote in an email. 鈥淚f hospitals are once again becoming stressed to capacity, the governor will no doubt consider the interventions we know work to reduce the number of people getting seriously ill.鈥
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