It’s official. Outside the masks, except in the spaces where they were required before the covid. The pandemic, in this way, has ended at the citizen level, although the WHO decreed its end two months ago. The Council of Ministers has approved today the report of the Ministry of Health that eliminates the obligation to use this garment in health centers, health centers, such as pharmacies, in residences for the elderly (workers and visitors) and in hospitals, except in the areas where they were previously required: spaces where there are immunosuppressed patients, in operating rooms and in ICUs.
Three years later, the mask goes down in history. A garment, longed for by many in the first months when there were not enough for everyone and that led all countries to search everywhere in a market that the former Minister of Health Salvador Illa described as “pirate”, reviled by the most as the waves of the pandemic receded.
Until now, it has already been withdrawn after the modification of the decree that imposed its obligation, although it continues to be recommended to avoid contagion of any respiratory virus in the population with symptoms and in those who are immunocompromised. From Health, however, it is recalled that it is mandatory until the standard is published in the BOE, something that is expected between tomorrow and the day after.
But experts warn: “Keep the ones you have.” Because the covid pandemic “has taught us” that viral threats are there and that it is not known when a pandemic will be repeated again. Something that everyone takes for granted as a result of globalization and climate change.
Four months ago, on February 8, Spain ceased to be the only country in Europe that maintained the mandatory use of masks on public transport. This measure came months after the rest of the countries on the continent approved it, although in many the recommendation to use it in closed spaces and on public transport in order to prevent the spread of the coronavirus continued to be maintained.
The removal of masks in transport occurred almost a year after their use ceased to be mandatory abroad, a measure approved on February 10, 2022, and a few months later (on April 20, 2022) after It is no longer used indoors.
“I think it is a day of remembrance for those who lost their lives and their families. And of gratitude to the health workers, the essential workers, the administrations and the ministers” who dealt with this pandemic, indicated the Minister of Health, José Miñones, who has recalled the long road of the covid, the declaration of a pandemic (March 2020), the state of alarm, vaccination (December of that year)… A long road of 1,207 days in which they have died thousands of people and tens of thousands still suffer from the effects of this disease.
