N.Y. mulls New Year’s bash; Los Angeles cancels its own
BOSTON — The nation’s secondlargest city called off its New Year’s Eve celebration Monday, and its smallest state reimposed an indoor mask mandate as the Omicron variant leaped ahead of other variants to become the dominant version of the coronavirus in the U.S.
The moves in Los Angeles and Rhode Island reflected widening fears of a potentially devastating winter COVID-19 surge. Much of the concern is being driven by Omicron, which federal health officials announced accounted for 73% of new infections last week, a nearly sixfold increase in only seven days.
In New York City, where a spike in infections is already scuttling Broadway shows and causing long lines at testing centers, Mayor Bill de Blasio is expected to decide this week whether the city’s famous New Year’s Eve bash in Times Square will come back “full strength” as he promised in November.
Omicron’s responsible for an estimated 90% of new infections in the New York area, the Southeast, the industrial Midwest and the Pacific Northwest, federal officials said.
Scientists say Omicron spreads more easily than other coronavirus strains, including Delta, though many details about it remain unknown, including whether it causes more or less severe illness. But even if it is milder, the new variant could still overwhelm health systems because of the sheer number of infections.
Organizers of the New Year’s Eve party planned for Grand Park in downtown L.A. nixed plans for an in-person audience, saying the event will be livestreamed instead, as it was last year. In Rhode Island, which has the most new cases per capita over the last two weeks, masks or proof of vaccination will be required in most indoor establishments for at least the next 30 days.
And in Boston, the city’s new Democratic mayor announced to howls of protests that anyone entering a restaurant, bar or other indoor business will need to show proof of vaccination, starting next month. City employees will also be required to get vaccinated.
“There is nothing more American than coming together to ensure that we’re taking care of each other,” Mayor Michelle Wu, a Chicago-area native, said at City Hall as protesters loudly blew whistles and shouted “Shame on Wu.”