Anvisa evaluates CFM’s request to remove masks at airports

The National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa) will discuss whether to maintain the obligation to wear masks on planes and airports, this Wednesday (1st), at the 2nd Ordinary Public Meeting of the Collegiate Board (Dicol) of 2023. masks was made by the Federal Council of Medicine (CFM).

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CFM sent Anvisa, on February 13, a document in which it concluded, based on scientific evidence, that there are no plausible reasons for the mandatory use of protective masks to reduce the spread of the Covid-19 virus. “Masks as signs of virtue or as a measure of a sense of social belonging can never be imposed on people who do not share such ideologies or behaviors,” wrote CFM president José Hiran da Silva Gallo.

In November 2022, Anvisa published measures that provide for the mandatory use of a mask by passengers and airport employees inside “airport terminals, means of transport and other establishments located in the airport area”. Regarding the measures, the CFM said, in a document, that “in addition to not having evidence of protection, there is evidence of harm to the health of crew members, passengers and the environment”.

In response, Anvisa insisted that it “bases its decisions on the best scientific evidence”. The agency also stressed that there are different groups of people on air transport, including more vulnerable people, such as pregnant women, the elderly and children.

“We need to be careful and wait for the behavior of the disease and viral circulation during and after Carnival. It is worth remembering that these same audiences still have low vaccination rates, and many have not yet completed the ideal vaccination cycle”, he highlighted in a note.