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At least 100 people gathered in front of the Idaho capital on Saturday to burn masks, in protest of measures to curb infections and deaths due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Some groups, mainly on the right, say mask mandates are a restriction on their freedoms. Health experts say they are helping to slow the spread of the disease.
More than 170,000 Idaho residents have been infected with the virus in the past year and nearly 1,900 have died. Johns Hopkins University puts the U.S. case at nearly 29 million and the death toll at more than 523,000.
Videos posted on social media on Saturday showed adults in Boise encouraging children to throw masks into a fire. One child could be heard saying: “Fire here, hunger? Here’s another mask. ‘
The Republican Gov. of Idaho, Brad Little, has never issued a nationwide mask mandate, but seven provinces and 11 cities have such mandates.
Visitors to the capital in Boise are asked to wear masks, but it is not necessary and few Republican lawmakers wear them. A Republican on Wednesday introduced legislation to ban mask mandates.
Other Republican-led states have moved to end mandates and reopen their economies, citing declines in the number of cases and increased vaccine availability – an effort driven by the federal government.
Amid warnings about a possible fourth increase in cases if public health measures are abandoned too soon, this week Joe Biden accuses such Republican leaders of ‘Neanderthal thinking’. Republican argument.
In Boise, a man who identified Darr Moon, a organizer of the Saturday event, told reporter Sergio Olmos: ‘I think people need to realize that we are here today to restore the government, to our republican form of government, government that has balance between the branches.
“And we believe that our well-defined government needs certain boundaries, and that is not what we have today.”
At the time of the incident, senators in Washington were implementing a $ 1.9 tonne stimulus and relief package aimed at intensifying efforts against the pandemic and reviving the economy plaguing it. Joe Biden welcomed the development and said he expects to sign the bill next week.
Moon also said the Boise rally was representative of a “widespread grassroots uprising”.
Olmos too film a protester who burns a mask with ‘Biden sucks’ written on it, another burn a photo of “Sleepy Joe”, and others refuse a police request to put out a fire.
Amid reaction on social media, political scientist Ian Bremmer said: “Ritualized mask burning in Boise wins this week’s award for symbolic folly.”