The Board asks that prevention services make a recommendation on masks

The Junta de Extremadura proposes that the occupational risk prevention services make a recommendation on the use of masks in the workplace and that decisions in this regard be adopted by consensus with the works councils.

The Official State Gazette publishes the royal decree modifying the mandatory use of masks during the health crisis. From today they are only required in health centers, services and establishments (except for people admitted); in social health centers and in the means of transport.

The regional government spokesman, Juan Antonio González, has indicated that with this new rule it is no longer mandatory to wear a mask in the workplace. But the Junta de Extremadura considers that prevention services should give their opinion. For this reason, it has been in favor of carrying out an assessment and reaching an agreement with the works councils, where the workers are represented.

“We have to wait for these occupational risk prevention teams to make a statement,” he said. In any case, he trusts the criteria of the citizens of Extremadura, whom he has praised for their behavior in the pandemic, for which he has given the response to vaccination calls as an example.

In the case of the regional Administration, the spokesman for the Board has indicated that the decision will depend on the conditions of each workplace. To that end, the prevention services will study each unit and make a recommendation on the use of masks.

Likewise, Juan Antonio González has indicated that he is studying whether or not workers can be forced to use these protection systems in the workplace now that their use is no longer compulsory.

Creex

The Regional Business Confederation of Extremadura (Creex) has indicated that the elimination of the obligation, except for some cases, in the use of the mask will have “beneficial” effects both from the point of view of the economy, as well as from the social perception and the mental health.

In this sense, the general secretary of the Creex, Javier Peinado, has highlighted in a press release that we must trust the criteria of the health authorities when making this decision, “which opens up positive expectations because it brings us closer to normality that we want so much.”

Peinado has added that this “sensation of returning to normality will also make our life normalize”, and that this is “positive” for the economic recovery, a recovery that, in his opinion, “is still far away”, since “The rebound that we are experiencing responds to the fact that before we were in negative growth figures, and we must be realistic in that.”

In the same way, he pointed out that the business community is taking on the new scenario “with the same responsibility and normality with which the measures that marked restrictions have been taken.”

At that point, Peinado explained that in the workplace, where the obligation to continue wearing the mask is not marked, the decision will depend both on “individual freedom” and on what they indicate, in the form of a recommendation or obligation, prevention services, for example in the case of asymptomatic workers.