Additional Information
As official health guidelines on wearing face coverings in public shift, some parents are wondering whether their children should be wearing masks when they go outside.
The answer, in short, is yes.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, should wear “cloth face coverings” when they are “in the community setting” to help stop the spread of the .
Other from “simple cloth … fashioned from household items or made at home from common materials,” noting that people should not wear surgical masks or N-95 respirators needed by health care workers and medical first responders.
Dr. Deborah Gilboa, a family physician and youth development speaker, said that since children are more likely to spread the virus, they should wear masks as often as possible.
“Kids are much more likely to be asymptotic carriers or presymptomatic carriers, so … we do a lot of good when we say, ‘Hey, in addition to washing your hands, and please stop licking things, we’d also like you to wear a mask,'” Gilboa told TODAY Parents. “We really want to slow and stop the spread of this, and we’re seeing in data from other countries that kids are actively involved, entirely accidentally, in spreading this.”