Indoor Mask Use 'Recommended' from the 30th... Public Transportation Rules Maintained
[Asia Economy Reporter Koo Chae-eun] Starting from the 30th, the indoor mask-wearing mandate will be lifted in all places except medical institutions, pharmacies, infection-vulnerable facilities, and public transportation. This comes 2 years and 3 months after the mask-wearing mandate was introduced mainly in multi-use facilities in October 2020.
The government’s judgment is that it is time to ease the indoor mask-wearing mandate as severe cases and deaths are decreasing, and patient occurrence and medical response are being managed at a stable level.
On the 20th, Prime Minister Han Duck-soo held a “Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasure Headquarters meeting on COVID-19” at the Government Seoul Office and announced, “From January 30, except for some facilities, we plan to discuss and finalize easing the indoor mask-wearing mandate to a recommendation.” He explained, “Considering the increased movement and face-to-face contact during the Lunar New Year holiday, the timing for switching to a recommendation was decided to be after the holiday.”
The Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasure Headquarters believes that the indoor mask mandate can be lifted because ① patient occurrence has stabilized, ② severe cases and deaths have decreased, and ③ stable medical response capacity is secured. Previously, the government presented four evaluation indicators for lifting the indoor mask mandate: ▲ weekly patient occurrence decreasing for more than two consecutive weeks ▲ weekly new severe cases decreasing compared to the previous week and weekly fatality rate below 0.10% ▲ availability of more than 50% of ICU beds that can be mobilized within 4 weeks ▲ additional vaccination rates during the winter season of 50% or more for the elderly and 60% or more for infection-vulnerable facilities. It was judged that three of these indicators, except the last one, have been met.
To protect infection-vulnerable groups, the mask-wearing mandate will be maintained for the time being in medical institutions, pharmacies, infection-vulnerable facilities, and public transportation. Regarding this, Prime Minister Han said, “It may be somewhat inconvenient, but I ask for a little more patience,” and added, “We will actively review whether to switch to a recommendation depending on future infection trends.”
Prime Minister Han also said, “During last year’s Lunar New Year holiday, the weekly average number of confirmed cases increased significantly. If the indoor mask mandate is eased on top of this, there is a possibility that confirmed cases will temporarily increase.” He added, “For seniors and other high-risk groups, we recommend wearing masks at any time in places judged to be risky.”
Prime Minister Han emphasized that the importance of vaccination has increased with the easing of the mask-wearing mandate. He said, “The bivalent vaccine has been shown to have an average of 76% higher effectiveness in preventing severe illness and 80% higher effectiveness in preventing death compared to existing vaccines. We strongly recommend that high-risk groups aged 60 and over who have not yet been vaccinated and elderly residents of infection-vulnerable facilities get vaccinated as soon as possible.”
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