The New York Instances and Washington Post have now come around to a position I advocated for right here on Medium last week: We should always all be wearing masks. Not just health care workers, however ALL of us. At any time when we exit in public.
Why?
Because they work.
Research from the SARS outbreak in 2003 shows that washing hands 10+ instances each day was 55% efficient in stopping virus transmission; wearing a masks was truly more efficient, reducing transmission by about 68%.
Combining multiple forms of protection — hand washing, masks wearing, gloves, and another layer of outerwear (gowning) — was 91% effective.
Read that once more: 91% efficient at stopping virus transmission.
COVID-19 and SARS are related types of viruses (coronaviruses), and it makes sense that what works to stop transmission for one will work to stop transmission of the other.
Masks work, first, because they are a physical barrier to no matter’s riding alongside on that air you’re breathing or moving through. Here’s a chart showing the relative barrier effectiveness for numerous supplies:
Secondly, they work because they preserve you from touching your face all day long. The masks makes you more self-aware of the truth that you’re not supposed to the touch your face- specifically, your mouth, nose, and eyes, and the areas round them- and in case you by chance do, you’ll touch the mask, not your skin directly.
Third, the expertise of other countries who masks show that masks work within the real world. In the words of Jeremy Howard, researcher and Masks4All activist, explaining a chart in his recent Youtube video showing how some countries have efficiently “flattened the curve” on new infections: “When you look at all of the international locations which have flat curves, they’re nations where masks-wearing is extraordinarily regular, and NOT wearing a mask in places like public transport could be considered anti-social.” He notes that the Czech Republic went from zero masks utilization to 100% in 10 days, and in the process they halted the expansion of new covid-19 cases. The Czechs made their own masks- the federal government didn’t give them out.
If you still have to be persuaded, take a look at this Chinese study of a neighborhood outbreak case on January 22 during the peak Lunar New Year travel season. A sick person on the bus who didn’t work together with anybody spread the virus to 7 others, a few of whom have been seated much more than 6 ft away. Two new passengers caught the virus half-hour after the original sick particular person had left the bus. NONE OF THE PEOPLE WEARING MASKS WERE INFECTED. Read the article, it’s very detailed, with a schematic of exactly where people had been sitting on the bus.
So let’s say you’re convinced, and now you’re thinking of some sort of face covering. What are your options?
First, please don’t buy masks commercially, if by some miracle you can find them now. Commercially made PPE should be reserved for medical personnel at this time. Unfortunately, the scarcity of commercially made PPE, and the shortage of foresight that caused us to be in such a position of shortage, is probably why we initially got this messaging of “Masks don’t work!” They do, of us just didn’t need you to understand it for a while, to avoid a run on masks. Think of the empty shelves in supermarkets throughout America where toilet paper used to live, and you understand why.
The best thing you can do to mask NOW are to use materials across the house. Get creative; anything that covers the mouth and nostril and stays in place will work.
While it’s best if the masks fits well and there aren’t any gaps between your face and the outside air, don’t surrender on your homemade masks when you can’t achieve that. Any face covering will preserve you from touching the skin round your nose and mouth directly, which could turn into the most important mechanism by which masks block virus transmission. When you inadvertently contact your face while you’re wearing a masks, you’ll just touch the masks, not your skin.
You can attempt to shape your face covering utilizing pipe cleaners or opened-up rubber-coated paper clips within the part that goes over your nose to make a tighter fit — experiment. A very powerful thing is that you simply wash your arms, put in your face covering, and exit of the house protected.
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