Niagara Health lifts mask mandate as other hospitals also ease rules

Niagara Health says mask requirements will be lifted on Wednesday in most settings across hospitals within the region.

This comes three days after several other health-care institutions in the province announced they would drop mask mandates this week.

Niagara Health made the decision to update the masking requirements after looking at serological data.

“Approximately 95 per cent of Ontario’s population have either had a COVID-19 exposure or infection,” it said in a press release Monday.

The organization says a steady decline in COVID-19-related and other respiratory viruses within the hospital and community also helped with the decision of lifting the requirement.

READ MORE: Several southwestern Ontario hospitals lift mask mandates

Niagara Health is still encouraging patients and visitors to wear a mask in closed settings where contact with patients or health-care workers is inevitable.

Physicians are still required to wear a mask when providing direct patient care.

Niagara Health says they will continue to provide masks to anyone entering the hospital who wishes to wear one.

The organization says visitors with a fever or respiratory illness symptoms should not be in the hospital unless they are visiting an “end-of-life patient” or caregiver, and should wear a mask.

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