[COVID-19] General Discussion

[Bada-Bing!]

Some Covid masks are better than others. I know – I’m the Mask Nerd | Aaron Collins

A cloth or surgical mask just doesn’t cut it, says engineer Aaron Collins

www.theguardian.com

Time to ditch the cloth and even surgical masks.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Nah

 

[Which Tyler]

Better than others =/= others are not useful.
And I'll wait on the actual research, over opinion or youtube channel.

ETA on reading the article rather than headline: "If possible, not a cloth or surgical one. These masks are moderately effective at capturing particles coming out of your own mouth – what we engineering nerds call "source control" " - So it's moderately effective then - which is plenty reason enough to wear them.

"A typical cloth mask, while better than nothing, only provides around 30-60% protection to the wearer." - So it's even pretty good at what it's not worn for - sounds good to me. If 30-60% protecion is unworthy of classification - exactly how good is "moderately" for their actual prupose?

Yes, better masks exist - that's really not news to anyone.
They're also multiple orders of magnitude more expensive, less reusable, scarce, and full of plastic waste for landfill.


Mr Collins reads as someone far more interested in garnering payment for writing an article, and continued payment for people clicking on his youtube channel, than someone improving public health

 

[Bada-Bing!]

 

[Bada-Bing!]

Better than others =/= others are not useful.
And I'll wait on the actual research, over opinion or youtube channel.

ETA on reading the article rather than headline: "If possible, not a cloth or surgical one. These masks are moderately effective at capturing particles coming out of your own mouth – what we engineering nerds call "source control" " - So it's moderately effective then - which is plenty reason enough to wear them.

"A typical cloth mask, while better than nothing, only provides around 30-60% protection to the wearer." - So it's even pretty good at what it's not worn for - sounds good to me. If 30-60% protecion is unworthy of classification - exactly how good is "moderately" for their actual prupose?

Yes, better masks exist - that's really not news to anyone.
They're also multiple orders of magnitude more expensive, less reusable, scarce, and full of plastic waste for landfill.


Mr Collins reads as someone far more interested in garnering payment for writing an article, and continued payment for people clicking on his youtube channel, than someone improving public health

Just generally, my own thoughts as well that certainly cloth masks are basically just cosmetic. 30-60% protection for the wearer, but surely needs to be much, much higher. And also needs Protection for both wearer and those around. But still I see peeps wearing the wrong type of mask in shops, not wearing them at all or properly and clearly not fitted right, so that needs addressed through general education campaigns by the Government, if cases are to be driven down and we learn to live with this virus, in conjunction with vaccination/boosters/ much better ventilation.

Health professionals in close contact with patients should really be wearing FFP3 where it has been shown that 99% of aerosols are captured. But personally I will leave that to them as they need that effective a PPE to work.

Looks like no further announcement today on restrictions.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

30-60% isn't just cosmetic and framing it as an all or nothing (i.e. medical grade or don't bother) is very dangerous messaging

 

[Bada-Bing!]

No new Covid rules in England before new year - Javid

The health secretary's comments come as England reported a record 113,628 cases on Christmas Day.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[Bada-Bing!]

30-60% isn't just cosmetic and framing it as an all or nothing (i.e. medical grade or don't bother) is very dangerous messaging

But still not good enough. If vaccines are not 100% and will wane over time and peeps are put off over time getting one due to side effects and not understanding they are there not to put you in hospital not not catching it. Still need an extra layer of protection IMO.

Very dangerous messaging? How? Because peeps are currently wearing not the most effective masks in congregate settings? Better quality of masks isn't dangerous messaging. Wearing lower quality masks, not wearing them properly and giving peeps a false sense of security is more dangerous imo.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Very dangerous messaging? How?

Because people will just not wear them at all if they're told the regular ones are pointless

Don't let perfect be the enemy of good etc.

Like WT says: he's some youtuber making hyperbolic statements

 

[Which Tyler]

30-60% is (much) better than thought for the wearer. Which is why protecting the wearer was never the point.
Factor in a greater protection for the non-wearer (patient and medic both wear masks), face shields, aprons, gloves, distancing and ventilation; and you're getting to a pretty damned high level of protection.
If you're wanting 100%, then nothing shy of a full hazmat suit will be good enough.

Then you've got the issue of cost. If you want me to wear an FFP3 mask, then my prices have just doubled immediately (assuming you also want a trusted supplier; this will immediately jump if an extra few million people need a few per day), as opposed to me swallowing the increased cost of an IIR mask.

Then you've still got the scarcity and pollution factors to manage.

 

[Yulia]

On the one hand I agree,to some extent (I'm not going to wear a gas mask either, for example)
But, on the other hand, he's not just "some youtuber" , judging by the article he's "a mechanical engineer with a background in aerosol science",so I think we can pay some attention to the expert's opinion and take something useful for us from his articles

 

[The Seeker]

 

[Bada-Bing!]

Because people will just not wear them at all if they're told the regular ones are pointless

Don't let perfect be the enemy of good etc.

Like WT says: he's some youtuber making hyperbolic statements

As others have said he's a mechanical engineer who has tested 100s of masks for effectiveness. And I have not actually seen any of his videos, but I wear FFP2/N95 grade masks. As for cost I Managed to get 50 for £15. I have used 4 so far with a mask on extender for and just bung them in the wash and they come out fine.

Once they go, then Will dispose of them at local hospital or Wilkinsons for recycling.

I am not naive to think that 67m peeps in this country will now start to wear FFP2/N95 masks but it's clear to me that wearing a mask properly which has a much higher capacity to capture aerosols (94/95% compared to 30-60%) in a congregate setting is going to reduce transmission by a lot and should be part the prevention/control policy if we're going to learn to live the virus, in conjunction with vaccination.

But proper messaging should really come from UKHSA.

Also, we keep forgetting about Long Covid. I personally don't want to test out catching it and suffering from it. Have two work colleagues one who caught it pre vaccination and suffered effects for more than a year and a second one who was double vaccinated and caught it the summer and still suffered from fatigue 3 months after.

 

[Bada-Bing!]

30-60% is (much) better than thought for the wearer. Which is why protecting the wearer was never the point.
Factor in a greater protection for the non-wearer (patient and medic both wear masks), face shields, aprons, gloves, distancing and ventilation; and you're getting to a pretty damned high level of protection.
If you're wanting 100%, then nothing shy of a full hazmat suit will be good enough.

Then you've got the issue of cost. If you want me to wear an FFP3 mask, then my prices have just doubled immediately (assuming you also want a trusted supplier; this will immediately jump if an extra few million people need a few per day), as opposed to me swallowing the increased cost of an IIR mask.

Then you've still got the scarcity and pollution factors to manage.

When we started out in this pandemic, we were told that masks were not needed or effective. And face cloth style coverings were there to protect others more than yourself, to capture your own droplets. But I think as we understand now that this virus is primarily airborne and transmitted through droplets/aerosols from people speaking, breathing, shouting etc in close proximity to each other this thinking surely needs to change to the wider population.

Wearing a mask to protect yourself (more incentive) and others needs to be the message.

As the so called YouTuber is saying ramp up production if necessary. There is also an argument for the government to provide them free of charge to over 60s/ vulnerable groups.

More recycling of single use face masks needed to deal with ending up on landfill.

FFP3 for frontline health workers in hospitals/GP practices dealing directly with Covid patients, who are still using 3 layer surgical masks. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/27/give-ffp3-masks-to-nhs-staff-omicron-doctors-say

Not one tool is 100%, including vaccines. But surely using vaccines and much better quality of masks are primarily going to be the way forward to live with the virus. The vaccines to stop/reduce peeps getting hospitalised/ FFP2 masks worn fitted properly to reduce transmission dramatically. Why is this country happy to accept to live with 100,000 cases daily?

Ventilation is also, but can we rely on all schools and companies, pubs, restaurants etc to implement a proper, regulated indoor ventilation? Firms, pubs, restaurants because of the cost of constantly pumping fresh air indoors is going to eat into their profits.

This Government's message is "be Cautious." "Hands, Face. Space." Although arguably that is the wrong way around.

It's clear locking down is no longer an option, so how we live with this virus and importantly reduce transmission is going to to be essential.

I know I will personally be wearing FFP2 grade masks going forward. But there is also a case to double mask as well if FFP2 grade masks can't be obtained.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

I'm not saying they don't work, though - I'm saying running a tagline of "Use X because the others do nothing" is dangerous

We're not living in a Dreamworld where everyone does everything they can to the highest degree - a lot of people who begrudgingly use a cloth/disposable mask will just not bother if they're told that they're not worth the effort
30% > 0%

Of course ideally everyone would use the ones with the highest degree of protection, but that will literally never happen

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Promising, especially as London has realtively low vaccinated numbers (compared to the rest of the country, anyway), and also a pretty crazy amount of people with it ATM

Obv 1.4% of **everyone in the world** is a big number so there's definitely still reason to limit spread as much as we can, but very promising if this is the way the disease is headed

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

My Dad was explaining a few articles he read over Christmas that essentially said that at some point of the third year of previous pandemics a less deadly strain comes about which results in a tail off for about 3-5 years before it becomes endemic.

Has anyone read/know about anything similar? It sounded interesting and also quite promising for the years ahead but obviously he couldn't give an in depth description of it. No one present would have had any increased knowledge of the topic.

 

[Bada-Bing!]

I'm not saying they don't work, though - I'm saying running a tagline of "Use X because the others do nothing" is dangerous

We're not living in a Dreamworld where everyone does everything they can to the highest degree - a lot of people who begrudgingly use a cloth/disposable mask will just not bother if they're told that they're not worth the effort
30% > 0%

Of course ideally everyone would use the ones with the highest degree of protection, but that will literally never happen

That's why I wear an FFP2/N95 grade one properly and look in despair at those who wear their cloth or surgical ones around their chins.

I also think the ones that refuse to wear one, are pretty much a lost cause when it comes to mask wearing anyway.

Hence why I think i am better off protecting myself to the max that I can.

 

[Bada-Bing!]

My Dad was explaining a few articles he read over Christmas that essentially said that at some point of the third year of previous pandemics a less deadly strain comes about which results in a tail off for about 3-5 years before it becomes endemic.

Has anyone read/know about anything similar? It sounded interesting and also quite promising for the years ahead but obviously he couldn't give an in depth description of it. No one present would have had any increased knowledge of the topic.

Spanish flu - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I think you only have to refer to the 1918 Spanish Flu to give an idea of this. And that was without vaccines.

 

[RedruthRFC]

When we started out in this pandemic, we were told that masks were not needed or effective. And face cloth style coverings were there to protect others more than yourself, to capture your own droplets. But I think as we understand now that this virus is primarily airborne and transmitted through droplets/aerosols from people speaking, breathing, shouting etc in close proximity to each other this thinking surely needs to change to the wider population.

Apologies for the source, but it's hard to disagree with any of this: https://www.mailplus.co.uk/edition/...red-our-war-on-covid-why-are-we-promoting-her

Accuse me of aftertiming if you will, but it seemed clear to me from the get go that this messaging was intended to reduce pressure on the PPE crisis. Another example of the short-termism in the government's approach assuming I'm rightt about the rationale. Once adequate supply chains for the NHS were established, a kite mark scheme for masks should have been established to ensure that all masks in use are of sufficient quality.

It's time that the government's lie about relying on people's common sense was called out more widely. Even if everyone could be relied upon to do this, they need clear, up to date guidance to do this. At the moment, they are relying on people to do their own research and draw their own conclusion in order to take a common sense approach. In order to give this any chance of working, people need to be told to:

- isolate until a -ve PCR test if experiencing any cold symptoms
- monitor air quality to ensure a minimum standard in all public spaces
- wear masks of a sufficient quality

There are reports everywhere of medical professionals failing to comply with these minimum standards, so it's clear that even those with the intelligence to do so can't be relied upon to show diligence in deciding what measures should be taken.