The Pennsylvania Department of Health changed its mask mandate, updating guidance for fully vaccinated residents to comply with federal guidelines, officials said on Monday.
An earlier state order came into effect that loosened mask restrictions in certain circumstances.
“Vaccines that are currently available across the state and country are highly effective,” said acting health secretary Alison Beam in a statement, noting that early research has shown that vaccines can prevent asymptomatic infection and decrease probability of spreading the virus.
“However, there is still more to learn about how long protection lasts and how much vaccines protect against new variants of the virus,” said Beam, “so some preventive measures will continue to be applied to everyone, regardless of their vaccination. ”
New orders from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that people who are fully vaccinated can:
- Visit with other people who are fully vaccinated inside the house, without wearing masks or physical distance,
- Visit unvaccinated people from a single household with a low risk of severe symptoms, without masks or physical distance, and avoid quarantine and testing after a known exposure, as long as they remain asymptomatic.
Beam said it is important for those who are fully vaccinated to continue to follow the guidelines when they are with unvaccinated people who are at a higher risk of serious illness or who have a family member at increased risk.
The guidelines still advise against meeting more than a few people and require a mask and physical distance when in public. Anyone with symptoms should still be tested, said Beam.
People are considered fully vaccinated when they are two weeks away from the second dose in a two-dose series or two weeks after receiving a single dose vaccine.
Across the state, more than 1.5 million people are fully vaccinated against covid-19 and nearly 2.9 million are partially vaccinated. The providers administered 4.3 million doses.
On Saturday, 24,789 people died in Pennsylvania from the virus since the start of the pandemic. More than 988,000 people across the state have contracted the virus since last March.
Megan Guza is a staff writer for the Tribune-Review. You can contact Megan at 412-380-8519, [email protected] or via Twitter .
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