This is something I’ve heard a lot, and assuming it’s true, what’s the science behind it? Surely holes in masks are the same size no matter whether the germs are heading in or out, but I’m guessing it’s not about the holes and I’m missing something.
Obligatory disclaimer: I’m not an anti-masker, I’m still wearing it in shops for example. This is just me wanting to understand.
In: Biology
Let’s imagine that you are not wearing pants, you are drunk, and you just randomly piss. You might randomly piss on someone else. And no one else is wearing pants either so when they piss, they piss on you. Now imagine that you put on pants. And now when you piss the piss is mostly stopped by your pants and very little of it will get on anyone else. Other people would have to touch your pants to get your piss on them. But other people can still piss on your pants if they are not wearing pants. You still get their piss on your pants and it will soak through and your legs get wet from piss. Now imagine that everyone is wearing pants. Everyone pisses on their own pants and no one gets pissed on.
Okay, so many people in here are saying that you primarily catch Covid from surfaces.
This is very much **not true**
We don’t. It’s actually extremely rare.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00251-4
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7333993/
The more important reason here is the aerosol concentration in the air. When there’s a lot of particles that carry Covid in the air, some of those particles will simply find a way to squeeze by your mask, be it through a crack or some of the fibers of a non-FFP2 mask.
This is obviously more likely to happen at higher concentration.
This is the biggest thing: The amount of Covid is in the air is the most important factor.
By wearing masks, **most** of the particles you exhale will be trapped in your mask. This reduces the concentration in the air around you and makes it safer for every other person in the room.
Guys, I say this very often on here, but please validate what you are saying before saying it. There’s large amounts of misinformation in here.
While we’re breathing out, our germs are in the water vapor of our breath. Imagine blowing a bubble. (With germs inside it lol) YOUR mask catches YOUR breath on the way out because of this vapor. Ever notice how after wearing your mask for a bit, it’s moist/ humid inside?
But if you’re not wearing a mask and you breathe out all these germs, after floating around in the air awhile, then yeah, the water vapor kinda wears out until it’s just the germs, and then they can fit through unfiltered masks. But obviously as everyone else said, the greater risk is touching stuff the germs have managed to spread to.
When you breathe out your breath also contains a lot of water vapour, bacteria and viruses can “piggyback” on the water vapour and travel substantial distances, breathing out can trap the water and also trap any infections carried by the water. This form of water vapour breathed upon someone can be prevented from being breathed in directly from another person, but the mask doesn’t stop that water vapour from hitting the rest of your face, your hands or some other part of your body and later being transferred into your body which is why washing your hands regularly is a good idea.
Not all masks are the same. The n95, respirators, and similar high-quality masks are all capable of helping prevent germs from being inhaled or exhaled, whereas the basic cloth masks pretty much only stop the exhalation, because they aren’t as closely fitted to the face. So you don’t blast a huge cloud of particles with breathing or coughs, but you can still inhale anything that is airborne with the cloth masks. N95s and respirators have to be fitted to your face, and seal more closely than the cloth.
The flat masks that the majority of people wear are designed to simply stop us from projecting all of our germs on everyone else. Instead of blowing out a large plume of respiratory particles we just have small cloud around our faces. Air is still able to flow around our masks and thus we can still breathe in what is in the air around us. A respirator or n-95 type dust mask needs to be fitted, and when worn correctly will filter particles from the air. This will effectively reduce infection rates.
Covid is a fluid-borne disease. It leaves a person’s body in water droplets they breath out. The water droplets are what masks actually block, making mask effective at stopping you from spreading covid to other people. However, there are lots of places in your body that covid could enter through: mouth, nose, eyes, ears, genitalia, anus, open cuts, etc. Not all of these places are covered by masks, making them less effective at protecting you once you have been exposed.
It’s just not true. It’s something people started parroting 1 year ago. Every study done on this has shown a protective effect by wearing simple surgical masks, in and out of hospital settings.
It works by helping keep other people’s droplets off of your mucous membranes. It also helps keep your droplets off of other people’s mucous membranes.
They absolutely do help with preventing you from catching it. ~~I don’t know where you’re hearing that it doesn’t help with that.~~ [Edit: Okay, I do recall that was said at some point, but we’ve learned masks do help the wearer.]
It reduces the chances. It’s not a 100% thing. Fun fact: If two people have masks, that’s even more protection. It’s filtered when you breathe out, it’s filtered when you breathe in. So two people wearing masks have two layers of protection between them, if only one of them wears a mask it’s only one layer of protection. It adds up.
Not putting it into the air helps a great many people. Wearing the mask if you’re infected (and/or staying home!) helps tremendously. Wearing it if you’re not infected is really only protecting you for that moment, if you were somehow 100% certain you weren’t infected. But if you catch it, you will almost certainly spread it to at least one other person. So protecting yourself _is_ protecting others. And here’s the huge catch: Most people with active CoViD-19 are not aware they have it. They are asymptomatic. It’s extremely helpful when most people wear them, whether they think they have it or not, because that blanket level of protection makes the virus have a hard time spreading.
Imagine some guy decides to pee on your leg. If you’re wearing pants, they will partially protect your legs, but not really. If he’s wearing pants, this will stop any pee from getting on you by a lot. But if you’re both wearing pants, you should walk away without any pee on your legs. I think I heard this on Reddit but the image stuck with me and I think would really resonate with a 5 year old.
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