PM encourages S'poreans to keep wearing masks outdoors if sick

Singaporeans should continue to wear masks outdoors if they feel unwell, even after the Covid-19 pandemic is over, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said yesterday.

- Walter Sim

TOKYO 

PM Lee, who is on his first visit to Japan since 2019, observed that the Japanese are "very, very conscientious”.

"It is a good habit, and I think it is a longstanding instinct," he noted. He added that it has long been a practice in Japan even before Covid-19 that "if you are sick, you go out with a mask and protect other people from yourself".

And as such, even as Japan has not imposed any punitive measures on those who do not wear masks throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, PM Lee said: "There is no compulsion, but there is a lot of social expectation. And I think that these are some of the instincts which we should pick up."