Which Countries Are Requiring Face Masks?

In Brief

Which Countries Are Requiring Face Masks?

As the pandemic continues, more than half of the world’s countries are mandating the wearing of face masks in public. Is it helping to slow the spread of COVID-19?

Months into the pandemic, countries around the world are seeking to tighten public health policies to contain the spread of the new coronavirus disease, COVID-19, until there is an effective vaccine. With growing evidence that face coverings limit the virus’s transmission, more than one hundred countries have issued nationwide mask mandates. Others, including the United States and Brazil—which have the two highest confirmed case counts and death tolls—have decided against federal requirements, though some state and city officials have issued mask orders.

 

Mask usage was already common in some East Asian countries before the start of the pandemic. The first countries to set national mandates amid the coronavirus crisis were Vietnam and the Czech Republic, in mid-March. They have since become more common, although some European countries, including Lithuania and Slovakia, have lifted or loosened earlier mandates due to low case counts. In countries with limited mandates, masks are most commonly required on public transportation and in indoor spaces such as supermarkets and stores.

More From Our Experts

U.S. leadership has waffled on the issue. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has advised Americans since April to use face coverings in public, which CDC Director Robert Redfield has called “one of the most powerful weapons we have to slow and stop the spread of the virus.” President Donald J. Trump opposed—and even ridiculed—the wearing of face masks before endorsing the practice as “patriotic” in July. Still, there is no federal mandate in the United States. More than half of the fifty states have statewide mandates, and most airlines and the country’s ten largest retailers, including Walmart and Target, require masks at all times.

More on:

COVID-19

Public Health Threats and Pandemics

Health Policy and Initiatives

Health

Global

Without national mandates, large percentages of people choose to forgo masks. In the United Kingdom, for example, less than one-fifth of residents surveyed said they always wear a mask when they go out in public, leading the government to impose a countrywide mask requirement for shops and supermarkets in mid-July. Similarly, France this summer expanded its limited mask mandate to apply to all enclosed public spaces.

Even in places with mask laws, some people have refused to comply; bus drivers and shop workers have faced attacks when trying to enforce mask mandates. Punishments for not following rules vary greatly: the United Arab Emirates and Lebanon are imposing fines, Qatar and Cuba are threatening multiple years of jail time, and Madagascar is forcing rulebreakers to sweep streets.

More From Our Experts

In some cases, the widespread use of face masks appears to be limiting transmission rates, though there are many other factors influencing the severity of a country’s outbreak. Vietnam, for example, reported a ninety-nine-day streak without a single case caused by community spread after being among the first to impose a national mask mandate.

More on:

COVID-19

Public Health Threats and Pandemics

Health Policy and Initiatives

Health

Global

Three men wearing protective face masks sit on a bench at Las Cruces Park in Madrid, Spain, amid the coronavirus pandemic, July 28, 2020.
People wearing protective face masks sit at Las Cruces Park in Madrid, Spain, amid the coronavirus pandemic, July 28, 2020. Javier Barbancho/Reuters

Although many countries without mandates still recommend wearing masks, some countries with low case counts have actively discouraged citizens from wearing them, arguing that the costs outweigh the benefits. For example, Norway’s health agency stated that transmission rates there are so low that two hundred thousand people on average would have to wear masks in order to prevent a single COVID-19 case. One of the few regions in the world without common mask mandates is Oceania, where ten countries have yet to report a single case of the virus.

Creative Commons
Creative Commons: Some rights reserved.
Close
This work is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) License.
View License Detail
Close

Top Stories on CFR

United States

Each Friday, I look at what the presidential contenders are saying about foreign policy. This Week: Joe Biden doesn’t want one of America’s closest allies to buy a once iconic American company.

Immigration and Migration

Dara Lind, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, sits down with James M. Lindsay to discuss the record surge in migrants and asylum seekers crossing the U.S. southern border.

Center for Preventive Action

Every January, CFR’s annual Preventive Priorities Survey analyzes the conflicts most likely to occur in the year ahead and measures their potential impact. For the first time, the survey anticipates that this year, 2024, the United States will contend not only with a slew of global threats, but also a high risk of upheaval within its own borders. Is the country prepared for the eruption of election-related instability at home while wars continue to rage abroad?