Irish Prime Minister, Michael Martin, said “we need to see each other again; we need to see each other smile; we need to sing again” when that country ended its mask enforcement.
Here are a few of the countries that have ended indoor mask mandates:
- Namibia
- Denmark
- Tanzania
- USA (except Guam)
- Netherlands
- England
- Norway
- Iceland
- Sweden
- Republic of Ireland
- Japan (never legally enforced masking)
- Finland (mandates remain in public transport)
- France (mandates remain at hospitals and public transport)
- Switzerland (mandates remain at hospitals and public transport)
“Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England”, according to a headline from the Financial Times on 11 March, 2022. One of South Africa's leading virologists, Professor Shabir Madhi of Wits University, said “We’ve made similar sorts of estimates for South Africa. It doesn’t mean the virus has disappeared – the virus is still among our midst and will be among our midst for the rest of our lives”.
South Africa has lower vaccination rates than some countries that ended mask mandates, but SA also has the highest widespread rates of recovery from Covid-19 recorded on earth. See this study for more details https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2119658
Having taken the extremely costly route of roughly 80% of people 50 years and older having been infected before Omicron, and many more after the latest wave, South Africa finds itself in a position virally similar to, or better off than, countries that have already lifted indoor mask mandates.
"Certainly we shouldn't be wearing face masks at all when outdoors. When indoors, there might be some individuals, especially people that are at high risk of developing disease even if they are vaccinated, that might want to continue wearing the right type of face mask, which is the N95 mask, especially when there's an increase in the amount of virus that is transmitting," Professor Madhi said.
For some people to make this informed choice is more than welcome. But for the government to force all South Africans to cover their faces (and in practice often not cover their noses) while indoors in businesses across the country is unacceptable.
