L.A. County health officials advised Angelenos against visiting states experiencing COVID-19 surges, such as Nevada, Florida, Louisiana, Missouri and Arkansas.

“I do want to recommend, especially if you’re unvaccinated, reconsider traveling to places where the seven-day COVID-19 case rates are increasingly high, like Nevada, our neighbor, or Missouri, Florida, Arkansas and Louisiana and others,” L.A. County Health Officr Dr. Muntu Davis said during the Board of Supervisors.

With the highest surge in the country, the Southern Nevada Health District advised its residents to wear masks in public indoor settings, Friday. This would affect not only Las Vegas, but North Las Vegas, Clark County, Boulder City, Henderson and Mesquite.

“As COVID-19 case counts and the positivity rate continues to increase in our community, the Southern Nevada Health District is now recommending both unvaccinated and vaccinated people wear masks in crowded indoor public places where they may have contact with others who are not fully vaccinated,” health officials said in a media release Friday. “… the Health District’s recommendation to wear masks in crowded public settings, including grocery stores, malls, large events, and casinos, is a step to fully utilize the tools we have available to stop the pandemic.”

L.A. County has seen a rise in daily COVID-19 cases of its own, with a 7-day average of more than 1,000 positive cases. This led Public Health to ask all residents, regardless of vaccination status to wear masks in public indoor settings, with Long Beach following suit.

Public Health also emphasized that all current hospitalizations in an L.A. County-run hospitals have come from unvaccinated patients.

“… to date, we have not had a patient admitted to a DHS hospital who has been fully vaccinated with either the J&J, Pfizer or Moderna vaccine,” said Dr. Christina Ghaly, director of the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, said Tuesday. “Every single patient that we’ve admitted for COVID has been not yet fully vaccinated.”

Public Health’s statements came days before CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said the U.S. is becoming “a pandemic of the unvaccinated” with nearly all hospitalizations and deaths coming from those who have not received a vaccine.

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