Contrary to media speculation regarding a Return of the mask requirement Health Minister Johannes Rauch (Greens) stuck to his statement from Monday on Wednesday: A decision on this will and must be made on October 23rd. That’s when the current Corona Measures Ordinance expires. The discussion gained new impetus on Sunday following Green Club Chairwoman Sigrid Maurer announced a partial comeback of the mask requirement.
Will masks be compulsory in Austria?
In a background discussion with media representatives, Rauch more or less followed the recommendation of the State Covid Crisis Coordination (Gecko) from last Friday and appealed to wear FFP2 masks: “We have to convince people: Wear masks in special settings.” However, appeals would only help to a limited extent, as we also know from international experience – vaccination is therefore still decisive and there are now significant increases once more, currently 100,000 per week, “that is the decisive instrument,” emphasized Rauch.
The Minister of Health presented himself to the media in the presence of Katharina Reich, Chief Medical Officer in the Ministry of Health, Herwig Ostermann, Managing Director of Gesundheit Österreich GmbH (GÖG), and Manfred Ditto, First Deputy Chairman of the Corona Commission and also a Gecko member.
Corona development is observed
Last Friday had smoke due to the increasing Corona numbers announcedthat the situation would be observed for a few more days – if the current development continued, we would have reached the point “where we have to act,” said the minister.
Since Monday, however, there has been a sideways development, Rauch noted today. However, if there is a risk of massive overload in hospitals, then there might very well be a mask requirement. But: “There is not one criterion,” emphasized the minister several times, and referred to the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and WHO – the “super cautious group”. In the latter organization, other topics are now on the agenda that have been neglected so far because of the pandemic. Ostermann also emphasized that one should not only look at the exponential development of the infection curve, for example. However, there are still great uncertainties regarding the future development of the pandemic, because the question of the seasonality of the infection process will only be answered in the next few weeks.
(Those: APA)