Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman has announced new COVID protocols for County employees and buildings. Effective Thursday, August 5th, masks must be worn inside all County buildings. Beginning September 13th, unvaccinated employees will be required to provide a negative COVID test each week in order to report to work.

In a statement Pittman said:

I have spoken to many of our department heads and union leaders about this, and while we understand that there will be some resistance, we expect that most of our employees will welcome this news. We are fully capable of vaccinating everyone who is currently not vaccinated before the fall weather comes, before flu season, before COVID surge season.

The changes in policy reflect changes in guidance from the Biden Administration and Centers for Disease Control.

According to Anne Arundel County Health Officer Dr. Nilesh Kalyanaraman:

We’ve known that the Delta variant is easier to transmit and causes more severe disease in people who are not vaccinated. In the past few weeks, we learned that vaccinated people can also transmit the Delta variant at higher rates than for other variants. The vaccines offer strong protection against the Delta variant, but we are seeing more breakthrough infections. The good news is that the vaccines continue to offer a high level of protection against hospitalization and death.

For additional information please see the press release issued by Anne Arundel County.