Philadelphia lifting remaining COVID-19 restrictions today

Fully vaccinated people are no longer required to wear a mask in nearly all indoor and outdoor spaces. Restaurants may end their 11 p.m. dining curfew.

Philadelphia announced it will lift its indoor mask mandate and 11 p.m. curfew for dining at restaurants on June 11. | COLIN EVANS / THE TEMPLE NEWS

The City of Philadelphia is lifting its COVID-19 indoor mask mandate and 11 p.m. curfew for dining at restaurants today, the Philadelphia Board of Health and Department of Public Health announced in a press release Wednesday.  

Fully vaccinated people will only be required to wear a mask in select settings, including health care institutions, congregate facilities, on public transportation and in indoor schools, camps and other childhood education facilities, according to the press release.

People are considered fully vaccinated two weeks after receiving their second dose of the Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines, or two weeks after receiving the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine, according to the CDC.  

The city is strongly recommending, but not requiring, people who are not fully vaccinated to wear masks in indoor and outdoor spaces and around others, according to the press release.

“For nearly fifteen months, the City of Philadelphia has had restrictions in place to protect each other, and I have no doubt that these restrictions saved countless lives,” wrote Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney in the release. “But Friday will be a day that we’ve all been looking forward to: getting back to doing the things that we love.” 

Temple University has not announced plans to update it’s four pillars of public health or other COVID-19 mask guidance.

“We’re still having conversations about these very things,” wrote Stephen Orbanek, associate director of issues management, in an email to The Temple News.

As of June 10,  more than 656,000 Philadelphians have been fully vaccinated and 844,000 Philadelphians have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, according to the Philadelphia Department of Public Health’s Twitter account

The city lifted most of its earlier this month COVID-19 safer-at-home restrictions, The Temple News reported. The city lifted those restrictions after recording its lowest COVID-19 case counts and positivity rates since September 2020, the lowest for both categories since the pandemic began.

Pennsylvania will lift its mask mandate on June 28 or when 70 percent of the adult population in the state is fully vaccinated, said Alison Beam, the Pennsylvania Department of Health’s acting secretary. 

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.


*