Orders requiring People to wear masks Outdoors has been lifted in Beijing

August 22, 2020

However, some residents in the Chinese capital will remain wearing face coverings for now. People of Beijing no longer have to wear masks outdoors, in a further sign of China’s success at overpowering coronavirus.

Health experts in the city have relaxed rules which formerly made it obligatory to cover your face when outside your home after 13 consecutive days with no new cases of Covid-19.

The rules on masks have been lifted previously, although a second lockdown was then forced to control a new outbreak of the virus in June.

It is not just the capital which is seeing development in eradicating coronavirus. China has conveyed no new locally-transmitted infections on its mainland area for five days.

Analysts say firm enforcement of local lockdowns have been behind China’s accomplishment in the pandemic, plus mandatory mask-wearing, mass testing and in places enforced home quarantines.

Even though there have not been any reports of locally derivative cases, there were 22 new imported cases of Covid-19 reported on Thursday. Most non-Chinese citizens are now being barred for entering the country.

The relaxing of the mask ordinance in the capital is the newest sign China appears to be progressively going back to normal.

At the beginning of the week, pictures of thousands of people in Wuhan – the city where the pandemic originated – cramming into a water park, unmasked and not socially distancing, went viral online.

Several people in the West expressed bewilderment that lockdown measures were being moved back in the country where coronavirus first erupted, while many other nations are seeing case numbers and deaths rise.

Despite the easing of restrictions in Beijing, some inhabitants said they would continue to mask up for the time being.

Some said they would feel safer if they continued wearing masks, while others feared social contempt if they appeared in public not to be taking others’ health earnestly.

“I think I can take off my mask anytime, but I’ll need to see if others accept it. Because I’m afraid that people would be scared if they see me not wearing mask,” one 24-year old Beijing woman said in an interview.