Wearing of masks likely to continue for 'very long time' as Monday reopening given green light 

A person wearing a face mask on a bus in Dublin 

The Irish doctor leading the World Health Organisation’s (WHO’s) response to Covid-19 has warned the wearing of face coverings will likely continue for a "very long time" as he warned Europe is still seeing a million cases of Covid-19 a week.

Appearing at a virtual conference hosted by NUI Galway today, Dr Mike Ryan said that despite the success of vaccine programmes, the use of masks to curb the spread of the virus “will probably extend for a very, very long time."