The Rio de Janeiro Committee to Combat Covid recommended this Monday (7) dropping the mandatory use of masks in closed environments in the capital of Rio de Janeiro.
With this, the city is the first capital in the country to completely abolish the use of the item.
Flexibility is also valid in schools and public transport. Schools, however, will have autonomy to decide whether or not students should wear a mask.
In open environments, masks were no longer required since October last year.
According to Alberto Chebabo, president of the Brazilian Society of Infectious Diseases, it is unlikely that the release of the item will cause a new wave of the disease.
"The epidemiological scenario in the city is very good. We have a reproduction rate [of the disease] of 0.35. We never had this rate during the entire pandemic," he says, adding that the positivity rate is below 2%.
Translated by Kiratiana Freelon