Clotilde Dumay, edited by Laura Laplaud / Photo credit: ESTELLE RUIZ / HANS LUCAS / HANS LUCAS VIA AFP 07:33, 09 May 2023

Since August 1, 2022, hospitals have been free to decide whether to maintain the wearing of masks, introduced at the beginning of the epidemic. The management of the Rive Gauche clinic in Toulouse has only just eased its health restrictions. An announcement greeted with relief by the staff but which provokes the anger of some generalists.

Masks are no longer mandatory in hospitals, clinics or practices since August 1, 2022, but in practice many health facilities had so far maintained the mandatory wearing of masks as a precaution. With the decline in the number of Covid-19 cases, hospitals in Montpellier, Limoges, Orleans and Toulouse finally decided to ease their health restrictions.

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"It's still relatively nice to remove the mask"

At the Rive Gauche clinic in Toulouse, Elvire Manetti, health manager at the clinic is relieved: the mask is no longer mandatory since March 29. "It's still relatively nice to remove the mask, especially when you have worn it 24 hours a day for three years," she told Europe 24.

But there are still exceptions within the institution. It will be mandatory to wear the mask in the following cases: clinical, respiratory or ENT signs, whether cough, runny nose, sore throat with or without fever. A measure that concerns professionals, patients and visitors.

"We need to work on indoor air quality"

In a month and a half, the clinic has so far not seen an increase in Covid-19 cases. But some general practitioners, such as Jérôme Marty, are wary. "Admittedly, we are on a significant downward trend of the small wave we had of Covid but if we let go of these measures, we really have to work on indoor air quality and nothing has been implemented," he says before adding that we should test regularly to know the increase or not of viral circulation. "It's done through testing in wastewater and currently it's not done." At his office, the doctor maintains the mandatory wearing of masks.