Public health doctors criticise government’s dropping of masks

President of the national association of public health doctors Gustavo Tato Borges has spoken out against what he describes as the “government’s diversion from the plan programmed by the Covid-19 technical group. “It looks like we are giving up”, he told Correio da Manhã last night referring to the news that masks in almost all indoor settings will be coming off tomorrow. “We hope the number of cases doesn’t go up a lot, nor mortality”, he said. At the opposite end of the spectrum, virologist Pedro Simas – the voice of calm throughout the pandemic – has welcomed the decision, saying “psychologically the pandemic will only be over when people take off their masks”.