The Los Angeles County Health Officer Order was modified to require vaccination verification or a negative test prior to entry to all mega events and event venues by October 7; children under 12 years of age are exempt.
The requirement for vaccine verification or a negative test within 72 hours prior to attending an outdoor mega event aligns with the recently announced national strategy and includes venues and events with more than 10,000 attendees that are ticketed and/or have controlled points of entry to a well-defined area, such as sport and music arenas and theme parks.
This is similar to the requirement for vaccination verification or a negative test prior to entry at all indoor events and arenas with more than 1,000 participants; this requirement has been in place since August 18. Many mega event venues established verification systems during the spring in response to previous capacity restrictions and Public Health will offer large venues and organizers of mega events technical assistance to assist with implementation.
The Health Officer Order also requires vaccination verification for customers and employees at indoor portions of bars, lounges, nightclubs, breweries, wineries, and distilleries.
The requirement for vaccine verification for customers in the indoor portions of bars, wineries, breweries, distilleries, nightclubs, and lounges and their employees applies to drinking establishments with either no restaurant permit or a low-risk restaurant permit and requires that all customers and employees have at least one dose of the vaccine by October 7 and full vaccination by November 4.
These establishments primarily serve adults and already require patrons to show proof of age; and while children do not usually enter these establishments, children under 12 are exempt from these requirements. Full vaccination verification for services in the indoor portions of restaurants is strongly recommended.
We in public health believe that targeted vaccination mandates are an important strategy for quickly raising vaccination coverage in our county and ending the pandemic, and we applaud our President, our Governor, our Board of Supervisors, our cities and school districts, and business establishments across the county for creating additional safety in spaces where people are intermingling with the use of targeted vaccination mandates. As evidence mounts affirming the safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines, vaccination mandates are an increasingly important tool to prevent future COVID surges that cause widespread suffering. The modified Health Officer Order aligns with the continued need to reduce risk for transmission and increase vaccination coverage; this is a reasonable path forward that can position us to be better able to break the cycle of surges.
Several resources for businesses have been created to provide guidance in order to prepare for the new Health Officer Order to go in to effect.
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