Fernando Simón predicts that the end of mandatory masks in public transport will arrive “next week or the following”
The director of the Coordination Center for Alerts and Health Emergencies (CCAES), Fernando Simón/. EFE/Fernando Alvarado
The director of the Health Alerts and Emergencies Coordination Center of the Ministry of Health (CCAES), Fernando Simón, assured this Wednesday that the end of masks in transport will come “soon” and in a “very short” period of time , for “next week or the following week”.
“The decision is not mine alone and the proposals come from the technicians, the experts and the autonomous communities”, said the person in charge of the health alerts to the journalists in Zaragoza, where he participated in the round table “Truth and Lies, binary code of the democracy”, organized by the LAAAB of the Aragonese Executive.
Until now, the recommendation of the alert report was to maintain them as a precaution until the end of the season of acute infections, approximately in March, and pending the impact that the outbreak of infections could have on China after abandoning the zero covid strategy.
But in recent weeks the debate – which is still ongoing – has resumed regarding the stability of the epidemiological situation in Spain, which the Christmas holidays have not altered, according to sources from this technical body to Efe.
In fact, Simón has indicated that what has happened in “the last few weeks in China has complicated the situation”, but even so, he has pointed out that the removal of the face covering is imminent: “I think that in a very short period of time, I don’t know if next week or the following week, the mandatory use of the mask will be withdrawn”, the epidemiologist said.
Responsible use of masks
But the director of the CCAES wanted to make it clear that “the message is not that the mask will be removed, but that the population must now be much more responsible”.
“When we have symptoms we should use it responsibly and if we are risk or vulnerable groups as well. We must understand that our health affects the health of others in some way, especially when there is an infectious disease in the middle”, added Fernando Simón.
