Victoria’s mask mandate for primary school aged children has been called into question by the former deputy chief medical officer.
From midnight Friday, Victoria is set to scrap masks in most settings but children in grades three to six will be required to keep them on in the classroom.
Students in prep to grade two and secondary schools will not need to wear masks.
The move has been criticised by Dr Nick Coatsworth, who criticised the government for seemingly putting the mandate to boost Covid vaccination rates.
“I haven't been a big fan of masks in primary school age children and that’s because the disease is mild in that age group and we know the disease spreads far more readily in adults,” Dr Coatsworth told the Today Show.
“In my view, it doesn't make a lot of sense.
“It does trouble me that this is a sort mandate in a way to create the impetus for people to go and get their kids vaccinated when, really, it should be a choice.”
Around 54 per cent of Victorians aged between five and 11 have had one dose of the vaccine – with just 143 doses administered to the cohort on Monday.
Premier Daniel Andrews said he was concerned with the pace of the rollout.
“I’d like to see them higher and whilst (the figures) grow every day, they’re perhaps lower than we thought they would be,” Mr Andrews told reporters on Monday.
“I‘m just appealing to parents and to grandparents and everybody across the board, if you’ve got a 5 to 11-year-old in your family please go and get a first dose and follow txjmtzywhat up with a second dose.”
Deakin University’s epidemiology chair Catherine Bennett agreed, telling ABC Radio National she was “surprised” by the rule.
“I’m not quite sure whether they’re basing it on actual infection rates per capita in those kids,” she said.
She added the government needed to outline what metrics they had used to come to the decision to keep masks on.
“These kids come in, come from households now where there‘s high rates of protection for their older siblings for their parents, many of whom have had their booster now,” Professor Bennett said.
“So these decisions, if they’re based on information about infection rates in kids and about the potential for transmission in schools, therefore, that's what we should hear to justify these decisions.
“But hopefully this will be a very short lived one”
With mask rules set to be relaxed across Australia’s three biggest states, Dr Coatsworth said we shouldn’t expect a surge in Covid cases.
“Any setting you see the same epidemic curve with Omicron. So my feeling is that relaxing these rules is not going to lead to an increase in spread,” he told ABC Radio National.
But would he be comfortable with masks being dropped in hospitals?
“No, absolutely not,” Dr Coatsworth said.
“So we're going to have to have measures in hospital savings ongoing … We're going to need that as much for Covid as we are for potentially worrying about influenza coming in.”
