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Mask mandates in German schools 'to end in April'

DPA/The Local
DPA/The Local - [email protected]
Mask mandates in German schools 'to end in April'
A young child in school in Baden-Württemberg, Photo: dpa | Uwe Anspach

German states agreed on Friday to bring normality back to the country’s schools by ending both mask wearing and mass testing.

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The decision to end mask wearing in April and stop mass testing the following month was made at a meeting of state education ministers in Lübeck on Friday.

According to Bild Zeitung, the requirement for children to wear masks in classrooms will be lifted on April 2nd.

Regular testing of children, regardless of whether they have Covid symptoms, has also been part of school life for much of the past two years. That will be phased out in May though, according to the agreement.

Alexander Lorz (CDU), education minister in Hesse, said that it was time that children were given a normal teaching environment once again.  

But he warned that “none of us can say what will happen in the autumn".

The state of Lower Saxony has already pushed ahead with plans to relax mask wearing rules at schools announced in February.

The announcement of abolishing restrictions in schools comes on the same day that federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach warned that Germany remained in a "critical" situation.

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Lauterbach said that the pandemic would not be over in the summer time due to the number of Germans who still have not been vaccinated against Covid-19.

Some three quarters of the population have received two vaccine doses against the disease, while 57 percent have received three doses.

SEE ALSO: Germany in ‘critical’ Covid situation, warns Health Minister

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