In a world moving on from the COVID-19 pandemic, hospitals and medical offices have been the last bastions of mandatory masking. But new research finds that in communities where pandemic precautions have been largely abandoned, mask mandates in healthcare settings do little to prevent coronavirus infections among patients.
The findings, presented Thursday at the European Congress of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases in Copenhagen, suggest that hospitals, nursing homes and clinics could adopt "mask optional" policies without putting their patients at increased risk.
The study's findings come almost a year after most European governments decided to let the virus spread unimpeded among their highly vaccinated populations. But with some of the last masking requirements now being dismantled in the United States, many here continue to debate the wisdom of declaring an end to the public health emergency.
