Masks are no longer mandatory in Spain on the street

The Council of Ministers will approve a royal decree next Tuesday that will eliminate the mandatory nature of masks outdoors, a measure that, “if all goes well”, will come into force two days later, on February 10, once it is published in the BOE

Covid in Spain: Masks are no longer mandatory on the street next Thursday


Several people walk through a street in the center of Oviedo. EFE/JL Cereijido/File

This was explained in statements to Efe by the Minister of Health, Carolina Darias, shortly before signing an agreement with AstraZeneca for the acquisition of 30,000 doses of the drug Evusheld, a monoclonal antibody aimed at improving the protection of immunocompromised people against covid-19. 19.

Health will thus carry out a new decree with which the imposition of masks in the open air will be eliminated, which will be published, “if all goes well”, in the BOE on Wednesday the 9th so that it can enter into force a day later.

Previously, the minister will give an account of the measure to the councilors in an Interterritorial Council of the National Health System that she has convened for Monday; the details of the standard are still being finalized, sources from her department tell Efe.

Masks are mandatory outdoors, unless individual sports are being practiced or in natural spaces, since last December 24; It was one of the measures that the Executive agreed with the regional officials at the conference of presidents held two days earlier to stop the advance of the sixth wave.

The decree that returned the imposition of face masks in open spaces – whose use had been relaxed in June 2021 due to the good evolution of the pandemic – was validated on Tuesday in Congress, not without little criticism from parliamentary groups.

Asked why the measure has been postponed for another week, Darias replied that it was adopted with the endorsement of the regional presidents at a time when there was “an exponential growth in cases due to the omicron variant and we had great uncertainty about how it would go.” to behave.”

And it is now, when three weeks of decline in all epidemiological indicators have been chained, when it has been decided to eliminate them outdoors, he added.

According to data provided yesterday by the Ministry of Health, the cumulative incidence of the coronavirus stands at 2,420 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, with continuous declines for two weeks. Last Friday it was at 3,078.

Daily infections are also being lower and hospital pressure is decreasing. All the indicators of the evolution of the pandemic confirm that the peak of the sixth wave has been overcome and its clear and daily decrease in all communities and age groups.

Hospital discharges outnumber new admissions and PCR positivity is also going down.

The Minister of Health, Carolina Darias, during the press conference after the visit of the vaccination device in the City of Arts and Sciences in Valencia. EFE/Biel Aliño

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