The ombudswoman from children’s rights Maia Bănărescu asks to clarify the minimum reasonable age from which children should wear protective masks in closed places. In a letter to Prime Minister Ion Chicu, the ombudswoman says the decisions taken by the National Extraordinary Commission for Public Health, by which the wearing of masks in public transport, commercial areas and closed public places was imposed, are unclear and easily interpretable in the case of children, IPN reports.
Maia Bănărescu warns that a small baby or a child aged between two and seven cannot satisfy the condition to wear a mask in the same way as a minor aged 15 or a person aged 18. That’s why the applicability of this requirement is disproportional in relation to the age categories of children until coming of age.
The ombudswoman considers the protection measure concerning mask wearing in closed public places in too general and interpretative in character and this allows for abuses on the part of the supervisory bodies and of business entities that provide particular services and are responsible for ensuring protection measures in closed public places.
Without questioning the necessity of wearing masks in closed public places, Maia Bănărescu pleads for setting down clear and specific conditions when the given conditions refer to minors. She believes a reasonable minimum age should be set from which children should wear protective masks in closed places without being affected by this and the opportunity of wearing masks in the case of children with disabilities should also be decided.
