COVID – At work, in stores and even in classrooms: almost two years after its general implementation, the French can remove the mask indoors from this Monday, March 14. Except in public transport and health establishments, faces are (finally) allowed to uncover each other. The vaccination pass is also suspended.
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Good news? Not for all. Constance, 23, is one of those who will continue to wear the mask indoors. “It’s a mix of habit, fear of getting sick and awareness of other dangers,” explains the French teacher. Like her, many are not ready to abandon it.
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Fear of an epidemic resumption, physical complexes, solidarity with people at risk, social anxiety… Their arguments are multiple.
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“The last barrier that protects us”
In his veterinary clinic in the Pyrenees, Sylvain asked his employees to continue to wear the mask. “First there is the epidemic recovery, particularly in the north. With the shift in school holidays, we assume that we will follow this dynamic in the south”, he explains. If some of his employees are disappointed, he highlights that one of them is also at risk. “Then, we each have very old people, in chemotherapy or immunocompromised in our entourage”, he continues. Health argument therefore, but also solidarity.
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Sylvain will also continue to wear the mask, not only at work, but also in all his daily trips: “as soon as I am indoors, at the races, in the shops, at the cinema, I will wear the mask, and an FFP2 ”. A student in La Rochelle, Laura, 22, shares the same opinion. “In supermarkets and at college, I will keep my mask on because there are a lot of people and still people who are infected”, she says, referring to the recent absence of one of her classmates, positive to the coronavirus.
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“I’m afraid of falling ill again, I had the Covid in a more or less serious form for three days and I don’t want to relive this hell”, adds, for his part, Constance. One of his only deviations, in two years of the pandemic, was going to a club on the evening of December 31, 2021. “I had been in contact ten days before and had just received my third dose so I felt fully protected”, she justifies herself.
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“We each have very old people, in chemotherapy or immunocompromised, in our entourage”
– Sylvain, 40 years old, veterinarian
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“I think it’s still a bit early to take it all off. I agree to authorize concerts, for example, but I find that keeping the mask remains the last barrier that protects us from the virus”, underlines Laura. Kimberly, a lawyer in an accountant’s firm, agrees: “For me, the best would be to remove the vaccination pass but to always keep the mask indoors”.
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Anxiety and social anxiety
Kimberly also says she is very distressed by this new absence, in particular because she is expecting a child. “I wouldn’t be pregnant, I would have less anxiety. But there, the fact that the Covid is a relatively recent disease and that we have little perspective, for example on the consequences for the child when you are pregnantI do not really understand why we remove everything”, she explains.
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The end of the wearing of the mask, from this Monday, can indeed be a source of concern and anxiety. For Kimberly, it will be more complicated to go out than before. “I will be even more anxious, especially since I will be one of the only ones to wear a mask, I will have to use an FFP2 and go out less until the end of my pregnancy”, summarizes the lawyer from Bordeaux. If her colleagues have resumed work in a hybrid format since February, she has obtained an exemption to telecommute full-time. “When I returned to the office after the January working remotelyI was really distressed, to tears”, she confides.
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“When I returned to the office, I was really distressed, to tears”
– Kimberly, 27, lawyer
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Cultural mediator in a museum, Louise, 30, explains for her part that the mask was “one of the only “concrete” weapons to fight against [son] level against the virus”. “I can’t imagine myself without wearing a mask,” she says. The Covid-19 caused him a form of social anxiety, following the forced removal of his relatives and confinements. “We have been so used to the fact that we had to keep the mask on for our safety that to see someone who is not wearing a mask today in the street is almost an assault for me”, specifies t -she. She has been accompanied for two years by health professionals and wishes to convert to a profession where contact with the public will be weaker. On a lesser scale, Laura also says she does not feel comfortable going to crowded places, where wearing a mask is no longer mandatory. “It is no longer familiar, we only see the lack of the mask”, analyzes the one who could go so far to restaurants, reassured by the vaccination pass.
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A mask for well-being
From Morlaix, Solenn, 32, has another reason for not removing her mask. Following a triple jaw fracture in 2012, several of his teeth are missing or broken. “I am very uncomfortable with the idea of having to take off the mask to pick up my children from school,” she says. These two years of restrictions brought him protection and comfort. “I no longer had to stop myself from smiling or hide my mouth with my hand when I was talking,” explains the pastry chef. She now dreads the moment when it will be necessary to remove it. “It’s going to force me to take on something that I don’t want to take on”.
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“The mask, by only leaving us the eyes visible, allowed me to obtain an easier passing”
– Louise, 30, cultural mediator
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A transgender woman, Louise adds that the mask has helped her in her transition, which began at the start of the pandemic. “The mask, by dividing us half of the face, leaving us only the eyes visible, allowed me to obtain a passing [pour une personne trans, fait d’être perçue comme une personne cisgenre, ndlr] easier. I have never experienced insults, transphobia or aggression. It may influence the fact that I want to keep my mask today”, she explains.
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In front of others
“Unlike before, where it was people who did not have a mask that we tended to question, now it will be the opposite: it is people wearing a mask that we will question. It’s true that I’m a little apprehensive about that, to say to myself “wouldn’t they make a comment to me because I have a mask?” Asks Laura. The international business student says she won’t take it off just yet. Just like Solenn, Louise or Kimberley.
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Sylvain adds: “For our clients, it will be take it or leave it. If they don’t put on the mask, they leave with their animal. But I am moderately worried because, even if we are not a health establishment, we remain a care establishment so I think that most of our customers will not ask themselves the question”, concludes the veterinarian with hope.
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See also on The HuffPost: Why we keep cleaning surfaces against Covid (when it’s useless)
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