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Saturday, March 15, 2025

PM encourages mask-wearing for protection, as virus still with us

by

ROSEMARIE SANT
970 days ago
20220718
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley MP, during his press conference on Monday 18 July 2022.

Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley MP, during his press conference on Monday 18 July 2022.

ROSE­MARIE SANT

 

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley says gov­ern­ment will have no hes­i­ta­tion in re­turn­ing to the mask man­date if the sit­u­a­tion with the spread of COVID 19 war­rants it, and he is en­cour­ag­ing cit­i­zens to con­tin­ue wear­ing masks, al­though the of­fi­cial man­date to wear masks was lift­ed on Sun­day.

Speak­ing at a news con­fer­ence Dr Row­ley said he is aware that while the an­nounce­ment that the mask man­date had end­ed brought men­tal, phys­i­cal, and psy­cho­log­i­cal re­lief, and peo­ple may want to be­lieve that COVID is be­hind us, “noth­ing is fur­ther from the truth.”

Dr Row­ley cau­tioned that the virus is still around, con­tin­ues to mu­tate, and re­mains “dan­ger­ous.”

He urged the pop­u­la­tion not to take the po­si­tion that “the pan­dem­ic is over and we can go back to nor­mal”.

The Prime Min­is­ter not­ed that the BA.4 and BA.5 vari­ants con­tin­ue to pose sig­nif­i­cant threats. In fact, he de­scribed the BA.5 vari­ant as still a pub­lic health is­sue that is caus­ing prob­lems akin to Delta, while be­ing as vir­u­lent as Omi­cron.

Dr Row­ley not­ed that the World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion (WHO) is ad­vis­ing that coun­tries should re­main masked. He urged the pop­u­la­tion to re­main “ex­treme­ly cau­tious and ob­ser­vant”, stat­ing that the gov­ern­ment will con­tin­ue to mon­i­tor the sit­u­a­tion.

The Prime Min­is­ter urged the pop­u­la­tion to co­op­er­ate and be sen­si­ble, and to wear masks to pro­tect them­selves even though the man­date has been lift­ed.

Prime MinisterCOVID-19HealthMask mandate


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