KINGSTON, Ontario (LifeSiteNews) — Another Ontario hospital has announced it is bringing back its mask mandate amid warnings from mainstream media that lockdowns could return this fall. 

On September 7, the Kingston Health Sciences Centre announced that it is reinstating its mask mandate, making it the fourth Ontario hospital to tighten COVID regulations in recent weeks.  

“The majority of hospital staff are frustrated with the mandates returning after the aggressive regulations of the past years,” an Ontario nurse known to LifeSiteNews speaking under the condition of anonymity said.  

“The current policy is that if staff feel sick, they will wear a mask and take a rapid COVID test,” the nurse explained. “With these policies in place, the staff feels that it’s redundant to enforce universal masking.” 

According to the Kingston Health Sciences Centre, “masks are now mandatory in the Emergency Department, Urgent Care Centre and the Children’s Outpatient Clinic and are strongly recommended on other units managing patients at high-risk.” 

Hospital staff are expected to wear a mask when caring for patients who are masked while masks are required for all patients with respiratory symptoms. 

Kingston’s decision came just a week before the Ottawa Hospital announced it was enforcing masks beginning Monday, September 11.  

“As we prepare for the respiratory virus season, we anticipate increased transmission of influenza, COVID-19, and RSV, The Ottawa Hospital will be updating some of out measures and supports to help protect patients, staff, and members of the public,” the notice read.   

Similarly, in late August, Ottawa’s Queensway Carleton Hospital tightened its mask policy to mandate them in all clinical and waiting areas of the hospital. 

“There is no general cause for concern, but we have reintroduced masking as a precautionary measure while we evaluate the changing indicators,” hospital spokesperson Natasha Curley asserted at the time.  

Furthermore, Perth and Smiths Falls District Hospital is enforcing mandatory masking throughout its two campuses, in addition to “social distancing.”

The mask mandate comes after weeks of mainstream media publishing stories alleging that COVID is returning this fall. In August, the government-funded Canadian Broadcasting Cooperation (CBC) published 18 COVID-related stories in just two days.   

Many Canadians have responded, warning that the mandate will lead to masks and lockdowns returning in full force this fall.   

Leader of the People’s Party of Canada (PPC) Maxime Bernier, who himself went to jail for fighting COVID mandates, recently warned Canadians to “not comply” with any future dictates should they be enacted again by government officials.     

CBC recently admitted that brining back masks would be difficult and likely opposed by many Canadians, suggesting “there would be a revolt” if lockdowns were reinstated.  

The mask mandate is being imposed despite overwhelming evidence that masks are not effective in preventing the spread of COVID and can cause a sundry of health issues, as LifeSiteNews has reported. 

Among that evidence is the U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention’s (CDC) September 2020 admission that masks cannot be counted on to keep out COVID when spending 15 minutes or longer within six feet of someone, and a May 2020 study published by the peer-reviewed CDC journal Emerging Infectious Diseases that “did not find evidence that surgical-type face masks are effective in reducing laboratory-confirmed influenza transmission, either when worn by infected persons (source control) or by persons in the general community to reduce their susceptibility.”   

In May 2021, another study found that, though mandates were largely followed, usage did not yield the expected benefits. “Mask mandates and use (were) not associated with lower SARS-CoV-2 spread among U.S. states” from March 2020 to March 2021. In fact, the researchers found the results to be a net negative, with masks increasing “dehydration … headaches and sweating and decreas[ing] cognitive precision,” and interfering with communication, as well as impairing social learning among children.  

More than 170 studies have found that masks have been ineffective at stopping COVID and have instead been harmful, especially to children.