Kaplan: Face Masks Could Speed Economic Recovery

President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, Robert Kaplan, has called for increased use of face masks across the United States to combat the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19).

“While monetary and fiscal policy have a key role to play, the primary economic policy from here is broad mask wearing and good execution of these healthcare protocols,” Kaplan said in a TV interview, as quoted by Bloomberg.

“If we all wore a mask it would substantially mute the transmission of this disease and we would grow faster. We would have a lower unemployment rate. We would grow faster and would be far less likely to slow some of our reopenings. But we’ve been uneven so far on mask wearing.”