Retailers give an inch, Babiš takes a mile

For months, retailers have been telling us that stores aren't a major source of infection and that there is therefore no justification for keeping them closed. Retailers were so eager to reopen and to sell their full line of merchandise that they proposed last week through a spokesman, Pres. Tomáš Prouza of the SOCR retailers' union, that respirators be required in public. This would further reduce the risk of transmission of the virus in stores. Retailers gave an inch, and the government took a mile. It won't let more stores reopen, but as of Thur., anyone who enters a store, public building or public transit will need a manufactured respirator, nano mask or double surgical mask. This is far from what retailers were hoping for. Stores were never a major source of infection, but now they will even be less so. Not only because of the requirement to wear a respirator, but also because the further hassle imposed on people by the government will cause them to shop all that much less.