PRO municipalities pressure the government of Axel Kicillof to make the use of a mask optional

The compulsory use of the mask in public transport, government offices and even in classrooms once again marked the differences between the government and the opposition in the province of Buenos Aires on pandemic management decisions. It is that in the municipalities governed by the PRO, the request for the mask to be of optional use in public transport, municipal offices and to remain free decision in shops. The decision that was made in La Plata, where Julio Garro rules, was joined this Monday by Bahía Blanca, where Héctor Gay rules. In addition, this Monday, a draft declaration entered the Legislature for the Buenos Aires Executive to “take the necessary actions to eliminate the mandatory use of a mask at all levels and modalities of education”.

This Monday it became known that Bahía Blanca joined the kick that La Plata had adopted on Friday. Thus, it became the second municipality in the territory of Buenos Aires to make the use of a mask optional in public transport. “The mandatory use of elements that cover the nose, mouth and chin to enter or stay in shops, in public service units and in means of transport within the Bahía Blanca party is void,” states the municipal decree of the southern provincial district.

“We take this measure with commitment and responsibility based on the high percentage of vaccinated people and the epidemiological context. Our position on this issue was always clear: it is a request that we repeatedly put to the Provincial Government, especially in schools,” explained the government secretary of the municipality of Bahía Blanca, Marcos Streitenberger, who served as spokesman for the measure.

The official also said: “Face-to-face classes do not pose a greater risk than the rest of the activities. Discourse has to be fair and equitable: we cannot force children to use them when they are not used in different political, institutional and mass events.”

He was not the only Juntos official who also called for the end of the compulsory mask in schools, as in the city of Buenos Aires and the province of Mendoza. It was also marked by the mayor of Pinamar, Martín Yeza, and this Monday, in the Buenos Aires Legislature, Juntos Senator Aldana Ahumada - who responds to the mayor of Lanús, Néstor Grindetti - presented a draft declaration calling on the Executive “to take the necessary actions aimed at eliminating the the compulsory use of masks - also called masks - at all levels and forms of all schools under the Directorate General of Education and Culture, where this compulsory nature still applies.”

The senator argues that “it is necessary to review the measure in question because there is ample evidence that it can be harmful - in several respects - to students” and uses as a reference “the recommendations of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control”, which “since May 2020 several countries in Europe - including Holland, Sweden, France, the United Kingdom, Ireland or Denmark - do not force primary school children to wear masks.”

Although Ahumada is part of the political space of Grindetti, in the municipality of Lanús they have not yet taken a measure similar to that of La Plata and Bahía Blanca. Near the community chief they told Infobae that although they “conceptually” agree with Garro's measure to “go one step further in the non-compulsory use of masks”, they seek not to confuse the population. “For the residents of Lanús, the State is only one. We have to go with a coordinated strategy between municipality, province and nation to give people certainty, but we believe that the Province needs to go one step further and adapt to the new reality,” municipal sources explained.

From radicalism they also got into the subject. The provincial deputy, Vanesa Zuccari said that “classrooms must be without a mask and schools without restrictions”. The legislator, who maintains links with the Organized Parents group, also stressed that “while other jurisdictions end the submission suffered by children, the government of Kicillof will only in two months analyze whether the mask ceases to be compulsory in the classroom.” And he said: “Far from reality, they do nothing but restrict access to education.”

However, in the government of Kicillof they ratified the compulsory use of the mask in schools on the basis -also- of the provisions of the Federal Health Council (CoFESA). They also called the measure of making it optional as irresponsible. With a short but strong statement from the Buenos Aires Ministry of Health led by Nicolás Kreplak, they called the decision of the PRO community chief “irresponsible” and assured that the decision was taken “without any scientific and health knowledge”.

At the COfesA meeting, health ministers from all over the country “reinforced the need to continue to wear the mask indoors and keep the environments ventilated”, while formally eliminating the two-meter distance governed by the protocol called “Safe Classroom”.

The officials of the different provinces in charge of the health portfolios agreed that “after eight consecutive weeks of decline in the number of cases of COVID-19 caused by the Omicron variant, there is a plateau in the trend in the last week”, and that “there is an early detection of a high number of cases of influenza, especially in the paediatric population”.

Even this Monday, the Minister of Health of the Nation, Carla Vizzoti, remarked that “the concern of all the country's health portfolios is the increase in respiratory diseases in the school environment, which is an environment where children spend a long time, with permanent contact. Therefore, taking into account the full presence and the beginning of autumn, the unanimous recommendation is to maintain the use of a mask, to recommend it not only in school but also in closed places”. It was under this scenario that it was defined to continue the mandatory use of a mask within the classrooms.

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