⁍ Prime Minister Mark Rutte urged citizens to wear face masks in public places when social distancing is impossible.

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⁍ Rutte and the top medical expert had argued for months against masks’ usefulness.

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⁍ A majority of political parties in parliament said for the first time that Rutte’s government should recommend voluntary wearing of masks.

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– The Dutch government is backing away from its long-held opposition to wearing face masks in public, Reuters reports. “What we wish to do is give the whole of the Netherlands some clear, urgent advice: from now on, wear a non-medical mouth-and-nose mask in public spaces,” Prime Minister Mark Rutte said during a debate in parliament yesterday. Rutte and the country’s top medical expert had argued for months that masks didn’t help stop the spread of the new coronavirus, but a majority of political parties agreed yesterday that voluntary wearing of masks was a good idea. A new law would need to be passed to make the masks compulsory in public places, but it’s not clear when that will happen. “In view of the situation we are in, having lost control of the virus, we think this is a necessary measure,” said an MP from the Socialist Party. “We don’t have time for consensus-building.”