Rome, 17 Mar The Italian Government announced this Thursday the start of the phase of de-escalation of the measures against coronavirus, in which the compulsory health certificate will be phased out, although the end of the mask is postponed. “The goal was to return to normal, to reconquer our social life, to reopen the economy, to get young people to go to school (...) Well, the measures adopted today recognize that we have come to that,” Prime Minister Mario Draghi said at a press conference. After more than two years of pandemic, Italy will abolish on April 1 the health certificate, which demonstrates vaccination or cure, outdoors and from May 1 also in numerous enclosed spaces, announced the Minister of Health, Roberto Speranza. Italy, the first western country to suffer the ravages of the virus, with its first cases on February 20, 2020, faces the return to a normality more like pre-pandemic times and will abandon the state of emergency on March 31. The Government decreed today that it will dispense with the scientific-technical committee that has advised it in decision-making and will abandon the color system with which every week it applied measures and restrictions to each region depending on its epidemiological status. On the other hand, until April 30, masks will be kept in closed spaces, with the imposition of the use of FFP2 in places of greater exposure as means of transport, while outdoors they are no longer used since February 10, except in crowds. The mask will remain in force until the end of April and “then the Government will assess based on the situation,” Speranza said. An important point is the health certificate, which has two versions: the basic one, which demonstrates vaccination, cure or that there is a negative test, and the reinforced one, more restrictive, since it is only granted to those vaccinated or healed by COVID19. The minister announced a path to eliminate its obligation with two phases: from April 1 it will no longer be necessary to be in outdoor places, such as terraces, and from May 1 neither in indoor areas. But it will continue to be necessary until April 30 in long-distance transport, dining rooms or outdoor sporting events, while the reinforcement will be in effect until that same day in indoor restaurants, gyms, swimming pools, parties and ceremonies or discos. “A discipline that, gradually, will lead us to the end of the health certificate from May 1,” Speranza celebrated. In addition, the suspension of employment of the unvaccinated will end, a sanction that will remain until December 31, 2022 for health personnel and nursing homes. On the other hand, Italy will end the quarantine of contacts with positives, something from which vaccinated people were already exempted. Both Draghi and his Minister of Health thanked the effort made in dealing with the pandemic and the vaccination campaign and stressed that this phase of de-escalation will depend on the evolution of the coronavirus and can be rectified at any time. This while the pandemic shows signs of acceleration because in the last 24 hours Italy has confirmed 79,895 infections, 7,000 more than yesterday, raising the balance to 13,645,834 infections since the beginning of the crisis, of the 157,442 died.
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