Mouth cap still remains – NRC

The optimistic corona news of the last few days has not yet put me in the flourishing mood that you should expect. I hear so many contradictions that I start to doubt everything.

Because things also take place in the same time frame, I gradually feel like a yo-yo in the hands of a drunken illusionist. In the morning I hear in the NOS News that the tent is opening completely in the United Kingdom and soon also in Denmark, but at the same time I read in my own newspaper that, according to WHO director Tedros, it is dangerous to assume that Omikron will be the last variant or that we are in the endgame of the pandemic have ended.”

Does Boris Johnson also hear this, or is he still too busy putting misplaced corona parties into perspective?

I would like to take the new health minister Ernst Kuipers at his expert word, but he is already beginning to err in graphs, something we could never blame his much reproached predecessor.

Nevertheless, I try to keep my spirits up and arrange with my daughter that she can come over at the weekend. The next day she reports that it cannot go on, because the granddaughter has received corona. A grandson also has complaints, but these may have been aggravated by the approach of a difficult school test.

In short, everything is still in limbo. Relaxations can again become stricter, after which the experts will explain that we should never have become so optimistic. “Hopefully we learn from it.” Then a grim Ernst Kuipers will show us dramatic graphs “that speak for themselves”. Only Diederik Gommers reacts cheerfully, he can leave his folding bed in the TV studio.

For the time being, we can only be sure of one thing in the Netherlands: the mouth cap will remain. In public transport and public indoor spaces, such as shops, museums, cinemas and the catering industry; only those in cinemas, theaters and the catering industry are allowed to take off the cap.

The question is: which mouth cap? There are RIVM guidelines about this that not everyone reads. I recently ordered a pack of fifty face masks that I must all throw away. They were non-medical masks, while RIVM now requires medical masks of type II or II R. This mouth-nose mask, as it is officially called, can only be used once and that for a maximum of three to four hours. It should fit snugly on the face and be worn over the mouth and nose.

I assume all NRC-readers adhere to these regulations, but of course no one else at all. I deduce that from the still triumphant advance of the infections. Most people put their caps in their pockets after use – I’ve even seen the Prime Minister do that – only to use it again after a while. Do I ever do that? No of course not!

There’s a good chance we’ll never get rid of those damn caps completely. Even if the last corona patient has left the hospital, Kuipers will still demand: “For prevention, the mouth and nose mask should remain mandatory for an indefinite period of time.”

But comfort yourself: in the United States, two caps, attached to each other, are already recommended. Then better corona.