Due to COVID infection, SF mayor Breed to miss Pride parade

  • by Matthew S. Bajko, Assistant Editor
  • Wednesday June 22, 2022
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San Francisco Mayor London Breed, fourth from left, posed for photos with LGBTQ city commissioners June 21, a day before she tested positive for COVID-19. Photo: Courtesy Facebook
San Francisco Mayor London Breed, fourth from left, posed for photos with LGBTQ city commissioners June 21, a day before she tested positive for COVID-19. Photo: Courtesy Facebook

Due to testing positive for COVID-19 Wednesday, San Francisco Mayor London Breed will not be able to take part in any of the city's Pride events taking place this weekend. The LGBTQ celebrations are returning after a two-year hiatus due to the ongoing pandemic.

According to the mayor's office, Breed will be following all isolation and quarantine protocols as recommended by the San Francisco Department of Public Health. Its guidelines call for anyone who tests positive to isolate at home for five days.

After five days, if they test negative, they can leave home. But if they continue to test positive, they should remain home for up to 10 days or until they receive a negative test.

That timeframe means the earliest Breed could leave her home is Monday, June 27, the day after the Pride parade will make its return to Market Street in downtown San Francisco.

"Like the overwhelming majority of San Franciscans, she is vaccinated and boosted. Mayor Breed is feeling well, and she will be conducting meetings from home. She will be attending no upcoming public events during this period of isolation," according to the June 22 statement from the mayor's office.

A mayoral spokesperson told the Bay Area Reporter in addition to the Pride parade that there are a number of planned public events Breed "unfortunately can no longer attend," including the 100th birthday celebrations taking place Wednesday evening for both the Golden Gate Theatre and the Castro Theatre.

Breed on Wednesday had been scheduled to help unveil the remodeled Gap headquarters at 2 Folsom Street in the city's South of Market neighborhood near the Embarcadero waterfront. She was also supposed to join elected leaders, city officials, and community members for the Mo'MAGIC Summer Kick Off event at Civic Center Plaza as part of Mayor Breed's Summer Together Initiative.

Breed had taken part Monday in the celebratory parade for the Golden State Warriors and had greeted the basketball players last Friday at the San Francisco International Airport the day after the team won its championship game in Boston against the Celtics.

On Tuesday, Breed had gathered with two-dozen LGBTQ city commissioners on the steps inside City Hall under the historic building's rotunda to take a photo with them. Prior to the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020, it had been a mayoral tradition to pose with out members of the city's various oversight bodies during Pride week for an official portrait.

Breed has long loved to participate in the city's Pride parade and in previous years has rode on her own float contingent in it. She was expected to do so again this year after SF Pride organizers and LGBTQ police officers reached a compromise that will allow some of the safety personnel to march in uniform.

Earlier this spring Breed and gay District 6 Supervisor Matt Dorsey, whom Breed had appointed to fill a vacancy, had said they would not march in the Parade if police were banned from marching in uniform. Under the compromise, the police chief and command staff of the San Francisco Police Department will be able to wear their uniforms while other officers will wear casual attire.

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