Now Hollywood brings mask mandates back! Lionsgate studios which makes Saw and Hunger Games franchises asks office staff to don face coverings and test again – as Covid hospital rates rise for fifth week

A major Hollywood studio has reintroduced Covid mask mandates amid fears about rising virus rates and a new highly mutated variant.

Lionsgate — best known for its horror franchise Saw and the Hunger Games — is asking staff to don face coverings again at its flagship office in Santa Monica, California, after several employees tested positive.

It is also strongly urging employees to test themselves before coming to their desks — and to alert managers if they test positive or have any symptoms of the virus.

The company — which employs up to 5,000 people — said the rules would be in place ‘until further notice’ with winter still officially four months away. 

It comes after a college in Atlanta, Georgia, also reintroduced mask mandates and a doctors began calling for coverings to be mandatory in healthcare settings. Nationally, Covid hospitalizations have risen for five weeks in a row, although they are still lower than this time last year.

Lionsgate, a Hollywood studio, has ordered nearly half of its employees to start wearing face masks once again. The rule is in place until further notice at their building in Santa Monica, California

Hospitalizations across the US have risen for the fifth week in a row, but they are also barely a third of the levels from this time the previous year

Covid deaths remain static at present after having risen four percent in a week. They are hovering around record low levels

The face mask rule was revealed in an email signed by the response manager for Lionsgate, Sommer McElroy, reports Deadline.

It reads: ‘Employees must wear a medical grade face covering (Surgical mask, KN95 or N95) when indoors.

‘[This is] except for when alone in an office with the door closed, actively eating, actively drinking at their desk or workstation, or if they are the only individual present in a large open workspace.’

The masking rule is affecting levels three and five of their five-story central office, they said.

Employees are also being required to inform managers if they have traveled anywhere outside Santa Monica in the last ten days.

The move came after the Los Angeles Department of Health said there had been a ‘small’ rise in Covid ‘indicators’ — meaning cases, hospitalizations and deaths.

Nationally, hospitalizations have risen for the fifth week in a row and are up 21.6 percent in seven days to 12,613 admissions.

But this is still barely a third of the levels recorded at the same time last year.

Deaths also remain static with 484 reported in the latest week, up four percent on the 465 from the previous seven-day spell.

There is no official data on Covid cases because of a lack of testing and reporting, but wastewater surveillance shows these are increasing.

The upticks come amid concerns over the Covid variants EG.5 and a fresh strain scientists fear could spark another wave of infections dubbed BA.X or BA.2.86.

Surveillance shows that the EG.5 strain is now dominant in the US, with experts raising concerns that it may be more transmissible than previous variants.

There are only six cases of BA.X recorded to date — with just one in the US in Michigan.

But there are concerns over the strain because it has more than 30 mutations and is genetically distinct from all other currently circulating variants.

This raises the risk of it being better able to dodge immunity to trigger an infection.

A staff member offers a face mask to a man at Chinese Hospital in San Francisco, back in August 2021 during the pandemic

Former FDA commissioner Dr Scott Gottlieb warned over the weekend that he was ‘very concerned’ about the new strain, saying it may be more infectious than other variants.

But at present, he added, there is no evidence that it is more likely to cause severe disease or death,

The Hollywood studio’s move comes after Morris Brown College in Atlanta, a private liberal arts school, also told students and staff to wear facemasks in hallways and lecture halls.

The college says the rules are in place for two weeks and have been triggered because of ‘reports of positive cases among students’.

Students are also being told to maintain social distancing and all parties and large gatherings have been banned.

The numbers of Covid cases in Georgia have increased for three weeks in a row, but overall, the number of infections and hospitalizations remains low.