Napa County on Monday joined the list of Bay Area counties recommending indoor mask-wearing for all residents amid the spread of the COVID-19 delta variant.
The county, as well as nearby Monterey, San Benito and Santa Cruz counties in recommended everyone, regardless of their vaccination status, to wear masks indoors "(out) of an abundance of caution."
Officials from the four counties said the recommendation will be revisited in the coming weeks. Prior to the weekend, Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara and Sonoma counties jointly recommended all residents wear masks in public indoor settings. The city of Berkeley also joined the recommendation.
Solano County is the lone Bay Area county yet to issue such guidance.
Public health experts have said the delta variant, now the dominant coronavirus strain in California and throughout the U.S., is more easily transmissible for unvaccinated people.
Cases and hospitalizations across the Bay Area and the state have increased over the last month since the state lifted the majority of its COVID-19 restrictions on June 15, while vaccination rates have stalled.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky, Director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a news conference last Friday "this is becoming a pandemic of the unvaccinated."
Napa County had fully vaccinated 71% of its eligible residents as of last Tuesday, according to county data, including 72% of residents in their 40s, 80% of residents in their 50s and 94% of residents in their 60s.
Younger people have not been vaccinated at the same rate. Just 64% of residents in their 30s have been fully vaccinated, as well as 59% of people in their 20s. Those percentages fall to 58% among 16-to-18-year-olds and 43% of 12-to-15-year-olds.
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