USA forces people to Effectively wear masks when taking public transportation: Violators may face criminal punishment
Under the new regulations, Not only passengers, but also bus system employees must wear masks, a face mask must be worn while waiting and taking public transportation, including airplanes, boats, trains, subways, buses, taxis and shared cars, while in or out of the United States; at stations, airports and ports.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also requires the type of masks and how to wear them. They can be market masks or homemade masks, but they must be composed of at least two layers of tightly woven fabric, which cannot be light-transparently and cannot have breathing valves when facing the light source; masks must completely cover the mouth and nose.
According to regulations, a minority group of people and some cases can not wear masks, such as children under the age of two, people who cannot wear masks due to illness, and when eating, drinking water and taking medicine for a short time.
After the outbreak of the coronavirus, health experts repeatedly called for masks in public, and many Americans are unwilling to wear masks. Wearing masks or not has even become a political symbol in the United States. After being sworn in as President of the United States on the 20th, Joseph Biden signed a number of orders, including the “100-day mask order”, which requires people to wear masks and maintain social distance in federal government buildings, urges local governments at all levels to take the same measures, and calls on the American people to adhere to wearing masks for 100 days from the 20th.
American Airlines operators and most other bus departments have required passengers to wear masks, and the CDC order provides a basis for staff to force passengers to wear masks. As required by the CDC, bus system operators should remind and supervise passengers to wear masks, and can refuse passengers without masks to take transportation or require such passengers to leave the transportation.
The CDC said that people who violate the “mask order” may face criminal punishment, but the CDC “strongly encourages” to wear masks voluntarily and supports civil punishment measures.
The “Mask Order” is scheduled to take effect on February 1, and there is no specific validity period.
More than 26.03 million cases of COVID-19 in the United States
According to statistics from Johns Hopkins University in the United States, as of 16:22 EAST on the 30th, the cumulative number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the United States reached 26,032,572 and the cumulative number of deaths was 438,708. The cumulative number of confirmed cases in the United States reached 13 million days after the outbreak of the epidemic, and in the past 64 days, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the United States has increased by 13 million.
Previously reported
Biden calls on Americans to insist on wearing masks for 100 days
Biden “onboarded” on the 20th at noon and signed more than a dozen executive orders in the afternoon, one of which required people to wear masks and social distance in federal buildings. Biden said that “you can’t waste time” and “these [executive orders] are just the beginning”. On the same day, he urged state and local governments to also implement “mask orders” in their construction facilities, and called on the American people to insist on wearing masks for 100 days.
Biden signed a special “mask order” on the 21st. The executive order requires people to wear masks at airports and on certain types of public transportation. These means of transportation include most rail trains, aircraft, ships and intercity buses.
The Associated Press interprets that the “mask order” issued by the federal government covers a wide range of areas, and people have little room to “take advantage of loopholes”. Previously, some people refused to wear masks in public on the grounds of violating personal freedom.