Spain has made it compulsory for all citizens, including children over six, to wear masks in public spaces as one of Europe’s strictest lockdowns gradually unwinds.
The Health Ministry order said the masks – whose efficiency in curbing the coronavirus is hotly debated globally – would be needed from Thursday for indoor public spaces and outdoors when impossible to keep a two-metre distance, Reuters reports.
Spain has suffered 27,778 deaths and had 232,037 cases of the COVID-19 disease, according to the latest data, while the tourism-dependent economy is forecast to contract up to 12.4% in 2020 due its virtual paralysis since mid-March.
To keep control on the gradual phase-out of restrictions, which vary from region to region, the government is requesting a two-week extension of the state of emergency.
Some are getting weary of the restrictions: demonstrators of up to a few hundred have been gathering daily at 9 p.m. to bang pots and pans and call for the government’s resignation. Mainly in wealthy, conservative neighbourhoods, the protesters have often ignored social-distancing rules.
