The Colorado health department released new regulations Thursday that will take effect across the state Friday, lifting nearly all capacity limits in restaurants, gyms and other venues.

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment is phasing out its dial system that governed counties based on their levels of disease and instead will allow counties to make their own local regulations.

Under the new rules, gatherings of more than 100 people must adhere to 6-foot social distancing requirements between vaccinated and non-vaccinated people, and those who attend them must wear masks. Gatherings of more than 500 people indoors, such as proms or graduations, require state approval. Venues that may are not held to such restrictions include houses of worship, retail shops and restaurants with indoor dining and no large unseated areas like dance floors.

The state must also approve large outdoor events in venues of more than 30,000 square feet. The state order did not address institute capacity limits otherwise.

The order also allows the state to intervene in counties if hospitals in that county are threatened to exceed 85% capacity.

The dial was set to expire just after midnight Friday, at which point individual counties assumed control over what COVID restrictions are levied there. Denver officials announced Wednesday that the county would take the state’s dial and use it for the capital city, at a minimum for the next 30 days. But Denver will also move itself down in the dial, loosening restrictions on restaurants’ and other businesses’ capacity, as well as reopening bars and pushing back last-call for alcohol sales. Other metro area counties have said they will adopt similar measures, though Douglas County has said it won’t.

Though Denver’s COVID metrics indicate the county should be in a middle-tier level of restrictions, officials said Wednesday that it will fall into level blue, the second loosest level of COVID measures. Bob McDonald, the executive director of Denver’s Department of Public Health and Environment, referred to the vaccination rates among older residents as the reason for further reopening.

But McDonald said it would be “very risky” to fully eliminate restrictions. Instead, Denver and surrounding counties will institute their own restrictions for 30 days. Denver officials were noncommittal about what would happen in a month, other than to say they would continue monitoring COVID metrics through the rest of 2021.

The state’s decision to step back and leave most control decisions up to counties creates a challenge, McDonald said, because there will no longer be consistency in the COVID response. 

“Any time you have counties that are close to or surrounding Denver that throw requirements out the window, it presents an elevated risk to Denver,” McDonald said at a press conference Wednesday. “I would just remind those outside of Denver, when you’re coming to Denver, we do have restrictions that will remain in place, and we need visitors to Denver to comply with those.”

The state’s hand-over to county control is happening as Colorado hospitalizations tied to the virus rise, and the highly transmissible United Kingdom variant is suspected to be responsible for half of COVID infections statewide. Modeling by the University of Colorado released earlier this week showed that should infection control measures like masking drop, and if variants continue to spread, hospitalizations and deaths could radically increase in the coming weeks and approach the December peak. 

At the same time, state and local officials say vaccination efforts to reach older, more vulnerable populations have lowered mortality rates across the state, and officials say hospital capacity will not be challenged. Protecting hospital capacity was a core reason for instituting occupancy restrictions in the first place. 

James Doxon, the director of culinary operations for Vibe Concept, told The Gazette on Wednesday that even with loosened capacity restrictions, he wouldn’t begin relaxing any safety protocols.

“We’re going to have our employees continue to wear masks,” he said. “We’re going to keep our tables 6 feet apart and have everything stay the same.”

Denver Gazette staff writer David Mullen contributed to this report.