In the absence of medical face masks, headscarves, recommends Minister of Public Health

A new recommendation to prevent the coronavirus was indicated today by the Minister of Public Health: the use of kerchiefs in the absence of proper medical face masks.

The official spoke in these terms, reiterating the recommendation that no one goes to grocery stores and supermarkets without masks, but, if you do not have them, then wear scarves.

“People who go to grocery stores to supermarkets must keep the distance they have been told. That no one goes to a grocery store, a supermarket, a market, without having a medicalface mask and in case they don’t have a mask, that they use scarves in order to protect their nose and mouth as much as they can,” recommended the minister.

It is recalled that on April 2, the president of the Dominican Medical College (CMD), Dr. Waldo Ariel Suero, proposed that Dominicans use their masks when they take to the streets as a key tool to stopping the exponential spread of the virus.

Serum considered the measure necessary due to the sustained increase in patients infected with COVID-19, coupled with high levels of mortality, the Dominican Republic being the Latin American country with the highest level of deaths.

“Naturally, this measure requires the logistical support of the government, which must provide the population with this important instrument of protection,” said the union leader in a press release.

This proposal of the CMD is based on the fact that the virus affects a community, so social isolation is urgent, and, above all, because Dominicans are not in quarantine, added the note from the Dominican Medical College.

WHO position . The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that medical masks should be a priority for health workers, but it opened the door to a wider public use of homemade masks or other facial protection to reduce the spread of the coronavirus.

“We must preserve surgical medical respirator masks for our front-line workers. But the idea of ​​using respiratory covers or mouth covers to avoid coughing or sneezing projecting diseases into the environment and towards others (…) that in itself is not a bad idea,” said Dr. Mike Ryan, chief emergency expert at the WHO, during a press conference.