Thank you for joining us for today's live page on Covid.

Here's a recap of what's been announced:

• Face masks will be scrapped in most settings including in shops, hairdressers and on public transport, but will still be required in health and social care settings
• Companies will still be expected to asses the risk of Covid in their workplaces and take precautions
• People will no longer be required by law to self-isolate but will be advised to do so if they test positive
• As many as 1 in 12 people in Wales could have Covid, the first minister said, adding that waning immunity could be behind the spike in cases
• While acknowledging anxiety felt by more vulnerable people, Mark Drakeford said Wales would need to learn to live with Covid
• Plaid Cymru and the Welsh Liberal Democrats express concern over the announcement, while the Welsh Conservatives say they support the decision

Good bye!

Michelle Davison runs the Conwy Art and Soap Bar.

She said said: “I think it’s welcomed from the point of view of people feeling a little bit freer.

"But from our point of view we are still going to keep our screens up because we are aware that it [Covid] hasn't gone.”

Our lives changed in a way we could not have predicted in March 2020.

Normal every day routines were banned, and since then restrictions have come and gone.

Will today mark the start of the end of all Covid restrictions in Wales?

The leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats, Jane Dodds MS, said there was genuine concern over the Welsh government's announcement.

“This is particularly the case as the government is seemingly sending out mixed messages: on the one hand warning us about how fast this current wave is spreading, but on the other continuing to remove facemask requirements," Ms Dodds said.

“The indication from the public is they would be willing to continue wearing facemasks in public settings while cases continue to rise at such a fast rate.”

Georgina Pattinson runs the Conwy Collectibles shop on Conwy High Street.

She said: "We've got a very small shop and I feel we need to protect ourselves so we shall continue to use these masks, probably all year, until we feel the Covid has passed.

"Because at the moment, just chatting to people, there are very many people just walking around today who say 'Oh, I've just got over Covid' or 'my son's got Covid' and you do feel a little bit vulnerable."

Plaid Cymru's health spokesman Rhun ap Iorwerth said: “I want to be in a place where we don’t need any measures at all to protect us, but we are in a place that causes apprehension to epidemiologists, to virologists.

"I’ve been reading up on some of the comments that have been made, and questions are being asked about why now, why not wait just a few weeks?

“This business about ending self-isolation is vital - we heard the first minister saying if you have the virus, you stay at home as if you had measles, for example, but this fundamentally changes the relationship between employer and employee.

"If someone has coronavirus and has no symptoms, that employer is under pressure to bring that member of staff in, and that’s where we have risk.”

Valerie Jones from Llandudno Junction was enjoying today's seed fair in Conwy.

She said: "I will still be wearing a mask because I have family members with underlying health conditions so I feel to keep them safe, I will carry on in supermarkets and on transport."

Russell George, health spokesman for the Welsh Conservatives, said: “We’ve been calling for the end of restrictions for some time, and that’s what we’re seeing, largely.

"I certainly agree with moving to the position of self-responsibility, with wearing face masks being recommended but no longer being in law.

“I would have liked to see the whole of the restrictions disappear on Monday, simply because despite the rising case rates, we’re not seeing the level of people going in to hospital due to Covid, nowhere near the extent was did in the time before the successful roll-out of the vaccine programme.”

Mark Drakeford said he did not expect to have to bring back legal restrictions such as self-isolation and tougher mask rules this winter.

While he did not rule it out entirely, he said it was "unlikely that we will need to return to the level of protections that we have seen in previous winters".

This was because of the protection that vaccination offers.

"Unless something entirely unexpected happens, or like a new virus that escapes the vaccine, then I don't see us returning to the sorts of restrictions that we've had to live with over the last two winters," he added.

The first minister acknowledged there was a "risk" any measures taken by the government to control Covid in future could be undermined by moving from law to guidance.

However, he said it was a risk that could be managed by "seriousness of messaging" and relying on the public's "sense of responsibility".

He added the Welsh government had to be "optimistic that we will be able to keep that sensible, responsible way of behaving in place", pointing to Scotland where self-isolation did not ever become a legal requirement.

Mr Drakeford also said that for the next three weeks, eligible members of the public would be able to access the £500 self-isolation payment from the government to replace any income they would get from missing work.

Pensioner Robert Hedge, who lives in Penmaenmawr, Conwy county, and relies on public transport, said: "It's up to the individual, if they feel safer wearing a mask, then good luck to them.

"I'm not overly bothered, I might [wear a mask] - it depends how I feel if there's a lot of people on."

Image source, Getty Images

First Minister Mark Drakeford said he would provide free tests and payments for self-isolation beyond June if funding was available from the UK government.

He said: "If we are in a position to go on providing tests beyond June, and certainly if the context were to demand it, then that is what we would wish to do.

"But it is a mixture of the availability of the tests on the one hand, and the availability of the funding needed to sustain a testing regime beyond June.

“We are using our own resources to keep them in place for longer than they are available elsewhere, and then we will have to make an assessment based on the capacity we have beyond that date."

First Minister Mark Drakeford said he understands the anxiety that people who are particularly vulnerable in Wales will have about the lifting of more restrictions.

"I have more letters from people anxious that protections are being lifted too quickly than I do from people who think we're going too slowly in Wales," he said.

"I absolutely understand that if you have an underlying health condition, if you've been operating your own life very carefully, that you are anxious at the thought that you might be re-entering a world where other people no longer take coronavirus seriously.

"It's why I've been at such pains this morning to emphasise, although we will be relying more in future on good advice, strong advice, than we are on the law, [the importance of] doing the right thing, doing the sensible thing, still has to be part of the everyday repertoire of all of us.

"And we've learned all those things, haven't we, so carefully over the last two years, on hand hygiene the keeping a respectful distance, wearing a mask?

"We're going to have to find a way of living safely with coronavirus."

Mark Drakeford said the new BA2 sub-type of Omicron is more transmissible than Omicron.

He added that most of the 1,400 patients in hospital beds with coronavirus were there to be treated for something else, rather than being there because of Covid.

He also said that thanks to vaccination and the other treatments which are now available, the number in intensive care for Covid treatment was not increasing either.

“There’s more than one form of harm from Coronavirus - it isn’t just the direct harm from people falling ill and long Covid and the loss of life that we have seen," he said.

“It does have that impact on the NHS’s ability to do everything else we want it to do, and when you have 1,400 people in a hospital bed with coronavirus there’s no denying it does have an impact on the ability of the system to do everything else we want it to do."

Wales cannot "go on forever relying on the force of the law" to keep the country safe from coronavirus, Mark Drakeford has said.

The first minister justified lifting some of the remaining major coronavirus rules, saying "we do have to find a way of living safely with coronavirus".

"It's going to be with us not just for the next few weeks, but through the whole of this calendar year - it's a challenging balancing act," he said.

"We have tried to find that spot where we recognise and respond to the growing numbers, but keep us on the basic journey where we are living with coronavirus, but not on the emergency basis that we needed for the last two years."

As many as one in 12 of the population could now have Covid, First Minister Mark Drakeford has said.

Latest data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) suggests one in 16 in Wales have the virus, but that data lags a week behind.

Mr Drakeford said: “The latest results from the ONS Coronavirus Infection Survey suggests one in 16 people have Coronavirus.

“Today, a week later than that ONS survey, we think that might be as high as one in 12.”