Miami mayor asks residents to wear masks while at home

The mayor of Miami, Florida, has encouraged residents to wear masks at home to reduce the coronavirus spread within families.

Francis Suarez said on Thursday that the number of new daily coronavirus cases in Miami has been getting lower.

However, infections between people living in one home was still a cause for concern.

Suarez said cases within households are the largest category of coronavirus outbreak sources in the city and contagion between family members is the most common way for the virus to spread.

He said that the city' needs to adapt its messaging to focus on the danger of different generations living in one house.

"Our messaging has always been, if you're outside or if you're indoors you need to wear a mask and you need to socially distance."

But now, he said: "I would tell our residents — and this is voluntary, this is not something that we can mandate — that they should consider, particularly if they have a multigenerational household, wearing masks indoors, at times, with their multigenerational residents and also respecting social distance when they're at home," he said.

Florida has become a new epicentre for the virus and is one of the worst-hit states in the US. 

It has recorded more than 380,000 coronavirus cases, and more than 5,500 deaths.

"Because again we're seeing the largest centre of spread being our house."

Suarez's suggestion came the same day that Carlos Gimenez, the mayor of Miami-Dade County, who echoed the request that people socially distance when at home with their families.

Source: Business Insider

Follow The Gleaner on Twitter and Instagram @JamaicaGleaner and on Facebook @GleanerJamaica. Send us a message on WhatsApp at 1-876-499-0169 or email us at onlinefeedback@gleanerjm.com or editors@gleanerjm.com.