Columbus mask mandate set to end after Arnold Sports Festival
Based on new federal COVID-19 monitoring levels released last week, the Columbus City Council announced Monday it would lift the city’s mask mandate for indoor public spaces at its next meeting in a week, a delay that coincides closely with the departure of tens of thousands of out-of-town guests from this year’s Arnold Sports Festival at the Greater Columbus Convention Center.
“Throughout this pandemic, we have followed the science,” Council President Shannon Hardin said. “And we thank those who have been on the front line for us throughout this pandemic, and … we can start to transition to the next phase of how we live and thrive with the coronavirus still in our community.”
A council spokesman had told The Dispatch last week that it would rely on the advice of the city’s health commissioner, and on Monday she told members the pandemic has moved to a new phase.
COVID-19 in Columbus: What health commissioner is saying
“What we’ve observed nationally is the virus has mutated, and the symptoms that most people are getting, particularly those who are vaccinated, are mild,” Dr. Mysheika Roberts told the council via video linkup.
She advised the city to monitor the CDC’s new community rating system for one more week, giving 10 days of data. If levels continue to remain in the “medium” zone or lower, the mask mandate should end on March 7, Roberts said.
The 10-day wait is substantially less than the four consecutive weeks that she earlier advised the city to wait if the numbers improve. Roberts attributed that change to a shorter incubation period the virus has displayed lately, which now appears to be around two days.
Also, “we have a lot of tools in the toolbox that we didn’t have in September and that we didn’t have two years ago when this started,” Roberts said, including the ability to vaccinate people as young as 5, booster shots, readily available home COVID test kits, and new treatments for those who fall seriously ill.
Roberts also hinted at another big development — the city headed toward spring, with the indoor cold and flu season increasingly fading. “We can’t lose sight of the fact that masks do work, and so there maybe times in the future, and I hope it won’t be until the fall or the (next) winter, where we might have to ask our residents to wear their masks again,” she said. “But now is not the time for that.”
She also noted that those with underlying health conditions who may be more susceptible to severe disease from COVID-19 should consider continuing to wearing masks indoors, and that businesses also may require them of their customers.
The council re-adopted the city’s mask mandate as the delta wave of COVID was accelerating in September, and left it in place through the more-infectious omicron wave that saw infections explode. Council was following the lead last year of Mayor Andrew J. Ginther, who about two weeks before had used his emergency powers to recreate the mandate by executive order.
Previously, Roberts had said for her to advise dropping the mandate would have needed the positive COVID testing rate in Franklin County to fall between 5% and 7.99%, and the cases per 100,000 to drop to 49 or fewer. While the CDC website showed the county’s positivity rate at 4.46%, the cases per 100,000 were 66.91 as of Monday. Therefore, under the previous CDC guidance, “Everyone in Franklin County, Ohio should wear a mask in public, indoor settings,” the CDC website said.
However, the revised guidelines drastically changed the metrics measured from the spread of the virus to its impact on health care system, taking into account changes in hospital admissions and ICU beds occupied with COVID patients. After the change, large areas of the country fell from the most critical “red” level into the new medium and low levels.
Two years ago this month, it was the prospect of The Arnold that had slapped city and state officials into emergency action, faced with the reality that the then-unchecked and largely unstudied virus could be massively transferred into the city by tens of thousands of athletes from as many as 88 countries, many of which among the first nations with COVID-19 outbreaks. That event, they feared, could help the then-novel virus spread among the 250,000-person gathering – and into Columbus.
On March 5, 2020, Dr. Amy Acton, the state health director at the time, issued an order shutting down most of the Arnold’s spectator ticket sales. A downsized event was held last year.
In other business the council:
- Authorized $2.4 million in new pedestrian-related construction on Sullivant Avenue between Hague Road and Interstate 70 in Franklinton. The project will add new pedestrian crossings, new decorative lighting and new drive approaches.
- Approved $3.47 million for the city’s new Hilltop Early Learning Center, which will be operated by Columbus Early Learning Centers. The money pays for design and implementation of a “high quality program of pre-kindergarten education and wrap-around services for students in the Hilltop area.”
- Approved $21.5 million for major renovations to the city’s Water Quality Assurance Laboratory at 910 Dublin Road. The lab, built in the early 1980s, houses the city’s EPA licensed and certified laboratory that completes about 60,000 analyses relating to 33 different organic, inorganic, and microbiological water quality parameters each year.
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