(Delwyn Verasamy/M&G)
Come 5 May, there will be no real direction on whether people should be wearing masks or not – even as Covid-19 infections appear to be spiking once more – with service providers in the hospitality and transport industries still waiting on the government to introduce new regulations.
The health department is urging people to use their “common sense” in the meantime, while it races to finalise the regulations, spokesperson Foster Mohale said.
“Even if the government says they don’t have to put their masks on … you know that you can easily get infected by the disease,” Mohale told the Mail & Guardian.
On 4 April, President Cyril Ramaphosa ended 750 days of a national state of disaster imposed in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, saying the wearing of face masks would no longer be required outdoors, but remain mandatory indoors.
Ramaphosa said the pandemic would now be managed by the proposed National Health Act, the draft regulations of which had been published for comment until 16 April. The regulations are aimed at controlling future epidemics that could result in high death rates and pose a huge threat to public health globally and proposes the wearing of face masks indoors, during gatherings and while taking public transport.
Ramaphosa said transitional measures would be put in place for a period of 30 days while finalising the regulations. The 30 days will expire on 4 May.
Speaking this week about the public consultation process, the health department’s Mohale hinted at resistance to a continued mask mandate, telling the M&G: “There will be the vocal organisations and individuals who are against any government efforts to save lives and some of them even go to the extent of influencing people on how they should respond, which is very wrong.”
Shabir Madhi, a professor of vaccinology at Wits University, argues that the debate about face masks has always been a moot one in the South African context, saying they were never really key to lowering local Covid-19 infection rates. This, he says, is because a lot of people in the country either do not wear the appropriate masks, or don’t wear them correctly.
“We should stop pretending as if the mask mandate does work in South Africa, it hasn’t worked in South Africa. It might work in other settings where people are more adherent to this sort of mandate regulation and are able to wear the right type of masks but in a South African context the starting point is that masks haven’t done much in preventing infection,” Madhi said.
The main focus, he said, should be on ensuring that more people get vaccinated as this is the most effective way to reduce the rates of hospitalisation and death.
“Again we should stop pretending that we’ve been successful in lowering transmission with all of the regulations because … had those regulations worked in preventing transmission we wouldn’t have seen three quarters of the population infected before the Omicron virus,” he said, referring to the highly infectious variant which emerged from the mutation of Covid-19 in South Africa’s fourth wave of the pandemic late last year.
Currently, three Omicron subvariant infections are accelerating across the country, probably fuelled by less guarded Easter weekend social gatherings a fortnight ago — similar to previous, though more deadly Covid-19 variant waves.
It’s however unlikely the government will reinstate harsher regulations — and the man in charge of mitigating the pandemic, deputy director general of health, Dr Nicholas Crisp, remains unconvinced that this is a fifth wave. Crisp is however nervous that “trouble may still be coming,” in the form of a totally different variant.
“I’m a public medicine specialist, so I’m not just saying it because I’m paid to be cautious. I’m nervous that this is not it yet,” he told the M&G.
Crisp said that as of the Freedom Day public holiday on Wednesday there were 5 026 laboratory-confirmed infections of the Omicron subvariants BA.2, BA.4 and BA.5, across all nine South African provinces, all highly infectious but causing only mild disease.
With vaccine hesitancy at its highest yet, Dr Crisp reiterated that vaccination remained the best way to protect oneself, far better than via acquired immunity.
“You can get cavalier and say you’ve been exposed or tested positive and are now immune — but that’s not how immunity works. There may be some degree of protection, but repeated vaccination, especially with a booster, creates far better cellular immunity than exposure to infection. Those who believe they’re protected via previous exposure are kidding themselves,” he says.
Crisp says half of South Africa’s adult population was now vaccinated at least once, although vaccination levels differ widely from province to province. Nationally, over 60% of people over 60 have been vaccinated at least once and 35% of those under 35 have been vaccinated at least once. However, some regions were at around 10% adult vaccination.
The World Health Organisation vaccination target level for minimum immunity is 70%, but this is complicated by constantly changing variants.
Meanwhile, SAA will continue to require both passengers and their crew members to wear masks on board, spokesperson Vimla Maistry said.
“Should the national department of health not amend and promulgate the regulations relating to the surveillance and the control of notifiable medical conditions as issued in March 2022 or give any direction to that effect, SAA will continue to comply with the regulatory directions in the best interest of our passengers and our employees as we are still in mist of the pandemic,” she said in a written response to questions from the M&G.
Lift Airlines will continue to comply with all the government’s Covid-19 regulations, including masks, its chief executive Jonathan Ayache said, adding: “As things stand, masks remain a requirement.”
The Restaurant Association of South Africa looks forward to the removal of mandatory mask wearing indoors, chief executive Wendy Alberts said.
“We certainly believe that it will uplift the overall morale of the staff who will also be able to get in some flexibility and freedom in moving with some sense of normality,” she said, adding however that the association would continue to follow health and safety protocols and regulations to protect both patrons and employees.
The Covid-19 virus has become part of our new normal and South Africa, like the rest of the world, must learn to live with it, Madhi argued.
“The goal for Covid-19 is no longer about preventing infection, the goal is about maximising protection against hospitalisation and death,” he said.
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