The New York Instances and Washington Post have now come round to a place I advocated for right here on Medium last week: We should all be wearing masks. Not just health care workers, but ALL of us. Each time we exit in public.
Why?
Because they work.
Research from the SARS outbreak in 2003 shows that washing arms 10+ instances day by day was 55% effective in stopping virus transmission; wearing a masks was really more effective, reducing transmission by about sixty eight%.
Combining multiple types of protection — hand washing, mask wearing, gloves, and one other layer of outerwear (gowning) — was 91% effective.
Read that again: ninety one% effective at stopping virus transmission.
COVID-19 and SARS are similar 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’re a physical barrier to whatever’s driving alongside on that air you’re breathing or moving through. Here’s a chart showing the relative barrier effectiveness for various materials:
Secondly, they work because they preserve you from touching your face all day long. The masks makes you more self-acutely aware of the fact that you’re not supposed to the touch your face- specifically, your mouth, nose, and eyes, and the areas around them- and when you by accident do, you’ll touch the mask, not your skin directly.
Third, the experience of other nations who mask show that masks work in the real world. Within the words of Jeremy Howard, researcher and Masks4All activist, explaining a chart in his current Youtube video showing how some countries have efficiently “flattened the curve” on new infections: “For those who take a look at all of the countries which have flat curves, they’re countries the place masks-wearing is extremely regular, and NOT wearing a masks in places like public transport can be considered anti-social.” He notes that the Czech Republic went from zero masks usage to a hundred% in 10 days, and in the process they halted the expansion of new covid-19 cases. The Czechs made their own masks- the government didn’t give them out.
In case you still need to be persuaded, take a look at this Chinese examine of a neighborhood outbreak case on January 22 throughout the peak Lunar New Year journey season. A sick individual on the bus who did not work together with anybody spread the virus to 7 others, some of whom were seated a lot more than 6 ft away. Two new passengers caught the virus half-hour after the original sick 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 the place people were sitting on the bus.
So let’s say you’re satisfied, and now you’re thinking of some type of face covering. What are your options?
First, please don’t buy masks commercially, if by some miracle you could discover them now. Commercially made PPE must be reserved for medical personnel at this time. Unfortunately, the scarcity of commercially made PPE, and the dearth of foresight that caused us to be in such a place of shortage, is probably why we initially acquired this messaging of “Masks don’t work!” They do, of us just didn’t want you to comprehend it for a while, to avoid a run on masks. Think of the empty cabinets in supermarkets across America where toilet paper used to live, and you understand why.
The easiest thing you can do to mask NOW are to use materials across the house. Get artistic; anything that covers the mouth and nostril and stays in place will work.
While it’s finest if the mask fits well and there are not any gaps between your face and the outside air, don’t surrender on your homemade masks if you can’t achieve that. Any face covering will maintain you from touching the skin round your nostril and mouth directly, which may change into crucial mechanism by which masks block virus transmission. When you inadvertently touch your face while you’re wearing a mask, you’ll just contact the mask, not your skin.
You possibly can try to form your face covering using pipe cleaners or opened-up rubber-coated paper clips in the half that goes over your nostril to make a tighter match — experiment. Crucial thing is that you simply wash your fingers, put on your face covering, and go out of the house protected.
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