The autonomous communities are considering this Monday whether to implement mandatory masks in health centers in the face of the epidemic peak of influenza and other health viruses or recommend their use, and they will do so within the framework of the Interterritorial Council of the National Health System, convened by the Ministry of Health, in telematic format.
At 9:30 a.m., the Interterritorial Council will meet in an extraordinary plenary session, at the request of the Minister of Health, Mónica García, in order to "unify criteria" with the autonomous communities and coordinate measures in the face of the resurgence of respiratory viruses, which have led to the collapse of hospital emergency rooms and Primary Care centers throughout Spain.
The mandatory use of masks in health and social health centers was already decreed this Friday in the Valencian Community, Catalonia and the Region of Murcia, while Aragon has opted for a partial implementation, only for health and care professionals in social health centers.
The Community of Madrid is the most reluctant and has ruled out the obligation. Therefore, in this autonomous region the use of masks in health centers, hospitals and social health centers will be "recommended and voluntary".
Other communities, such as Andalusia, have said that they will wait for what the Council says, although they have agreed to speed up vaccination, which can be received without an appointment, while Castilla-La Mancha has advanced that it will adopt a decision "depending on what the technicians indicate".
Canary Islands and Cantabria are also waiting for the conclusions of the Interterritorial Health Council this Monday.
Communities such as La Rioja, Asturias, Galicia, Castilla y León or Navarra are, for the moment, more in favor of the recommendation and in some cases, such as the Comunidad Foral, argue that the obligation implies a regulatory adjustment that "must be studied in depth".
The Basque Country has also opted to recommend the mask. The Department of Health acknowledges that the health system is under tension with "moments of overload", but denies that there is a collapse, so they do not see it necessary to resort to drastic measures.
And in the Balearic Islands it is only recommended for people with respiratory symptoms.
With the imposition of the mask in health centers, a measure that decayed six months ago, on July 5, 2023, is recovered, when the agreement of the Council of Ministers was published in the BOE, by which its use ceased to be mandatory in health and social health centers and pharmacies.
Although during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Government resorted to decree laws to regulate the use of masks, the decision to implement or not its mandatory use is the "responsibility" of the autonomous communities, as admitted by Minister Mónica García, who has offered the support of her Ministry to "coordinate" the measure, but respecting the autonomous powers.
The mandatory use of masks in health centers is endorsed by the Family Medicine societies, the Spanish Society of Emergency and Emergency Medicine (SEMES) and the Federation of Associations for the Defense of Public Health (FADSP), which even propose extending the obligation to public transport and spaces without adequate ventilation.
According to the latest data from the Acute Respiratory Infection Surveillance System (SiVIRA) of the Carlos III Health Institute, hospital admissions for influenza have increased by 60% in one week, to 9.5 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, 3.6 points more than the previous week, and rising since the end of October.