Virus: Portugal moves towards wearing a mask in the street

Lisbon | The Portuguese government on Wednesday announced its intention to ask Parliament to legislate to make it mandatory to wear a mask in the street and download a mobile contact tracing application.

• Read also: All developments in the COVID-19 pandemic

“We are going to submit to the Assembly of the Republic a bill, with an urgent nature, which makes it compulsory to wear a mask on public roads, as soon as there are other people on this public road. », Declared Prime Minister Antonio Costa after a Council of Ministers which took a series of measures aimed at curbing the COVID-19 epidemic.

Wearing a mask in the streets is already recommended in situations where it is impossible to comply with the rules of social distancing.

The socialist executive also wishes to make compulsory the downloading and use of the tracking application designed by the Portuguese authorities, at least “in the professional, school, academic, as well as within the police and armed forces and then all public administrations ”, explained Mr. Costa.

The government has also decided to ban gatherings of more than five people, against ten so far, and to limit to 50 the number of participants in family reunions such as weddings or baptisms, where barrier gestures and social distancing should remain de rigueur.

The number of new coronavirus infections reported in Portugal hit a new record on Wednesday since the start of the epidemic, with just over 2,000 new cases in 24 hours.

During the last week, this country of ten million inhabitants detected on average more than 1,400 new infections daily.

In total, Portugal has 91,193 confirmed cases and 2,117 deaths from COVID-19.

“We can describe the evolution of the pandemic in our country as serious”, said Prime Minister Antonio Costa, stressing that “Portugal is not an exception” in the context of the resurgence of the health crisis in Europe.