New preprint showing that normal respiratory activities produce more aerosols than do "aerosol generating procedures" such as high-flow nasal oxygen and positive pressure ventilation. https://t.co/IMxSaMRT7L HT: Guy Marks pic.twitter.com/t9TY8VSkdk
“Santa was not feeling unwell before the visit & did not show any symptoms of virus... he kept his distance from residents & wore a face covering” /44 https://t.co/YcV9n3UGuX
Case report of a hospital COVID-19 outbreak probably caused by airborne transmission. A child with an infected mother was admitted, after which 6 healthcare workers, 2 child patients, and 1 parent tested positive.
New Zealand: 1 index case airport at service firm and no other colleagues found infected so far (as of Feb 19)
Burnet Institute epidemiologist Mike Toole said if Holiday Inn hotel workers had been wearing fitted N95 respirators and face shields they would have been unlikely to get infected.
HOPE FOR SCHOOLS? Among 17 rural Wisconsin schools, with high student mask-wearing, the #COVID19 incidence among students & staff was lower than in the county overall (3,453 versus 5,466 per 100,000). Only 7 of 191 cases linked to in-school spread.https://t.co/tpCE8GgFXkpic.twitter.com/rX6aZfum2L
Organizational "anecdotes" like this are interesting & powerful, especially for a business with a budget as high as the @NFL. They are profoundly more motivated by keeping players in the game than by regulations or ideology. In this case, following good science protects huge $$. https://t.co/HcHwkjWngw
As indicated before, many governments act according the advice their OMTs or outbreak management teams give them regarding how to tackle the spread of SARS-CoV-2. Following the crisis via press reports, statements of politicians on Twitter, statements of virologists and epidemiologists on Twitter and not only the statistics of death toll, hospitalizations, number of patients on ICUs and those suffering from long-Covid gives a full picture what happens. It is also necessary to know what kind of 'official advice' national public health authorities provide to their citizens. To complete the picture it's also helpful to monitor the behavioral changes of national 'CDCs' in order to find out if there have been any adaptations regarding the severeness of the crisis or the virus itself. It's helpful to see if some to what degree national 'CDCs' changed their publications indicating a changed routine, if there is a change at all. Without naming any specific countries it has to be said that some of those are still busy with 'GAGA research'¹, thus things which should have been abandoned a year ago in order to put as many resources into the emerging new mega crisis we in Europe have been facing since the beginning of last year (2020).
Gaga research still going on while hundreds or thousands of mostly, but not exclusively, elderly citizens are dying. Gaga¹ research of highly qualified and educated specialists in their field perhaps, but with a lack of vision what's the right thing to do in an existential crisis. Researchers employed for many years, perhaps decades without a challenge of having to act 'fast & brutal' and to use all techniques and resources which are currently available, and not using those methods learned from books which have been printed in the 1960s or 1970s. Kind of a similar problem with the faculty of economics where many 'orthodox' economists predominantly in countries like Germany, Austria or the Netherlands have been taught or are still learning from professors as well as from 'printed knowledge' that are still occupied with 'high inflation', which was indeed a major problem the last time in the 1970s and the 1920s in e.g. Germany after World War I. The latter event of extreme inflation destabilizing a country to the brink and the result was - Hitler-, the only problem is that the other event in the early 1930 was deflation which led to mass unemployment and ultimately to the reign of -Hitler. We have to consider all facts and not just pick those we know because of 'group think' or easier: exchange information who also favor one particular theory. It's perhaps OK to have a quite flat learning curve during a new economic crisis which cost the economy a few percent of GDP. Most likely it won't affect a country's death rate.
It's not all right however to discuss the 'right way' of tackling a crisis while the physical existence of parts of the population is at stake. 'Business as usual' except that large parts of the population are demobilized without taking care of significant flaws like health care workers infecting colleagues or even worse: elderly patients. Being a scientist in fields which are a matter of life and (mass) death also comes along with a responsibility for human life and livelihoods. It's not exclusively about statistics of numbers of dead, hospital beds, ICU occupation, new infections, the 'R value' and some other indicators, or science as a matter of making one's living. Of course it's absolutely necessary to have such numbers as gauge how (fast) the virus is spreading. That's undisputed, but what comes next is significant: Do we tackle the virus the way the people in the 19th and beginning of the 20th Century have 'tackled' it and what is written in history books and presumably in many epidemiology books as well (have to admit did not read them at all) by using methods of 'avoiding' new infections by distancing. There are two major problems with that method of 'avoidance':
A Avoiding works when the spread (by infecting other individuals) is caused by droplets with just a limited range. A wrong assumption missing the point that the spread is caused by the tiniest particles hovering in the air we all breathe would have disastrous consequences.
B Avoiding the virus on a massive scale will disrupt the economy which is nowadays much more than 100 years ago depended on 'distributed manufacturing'
It's also helpful to know some facts about 'war history' and the way soldiers in the trenches and their commanding officers were since 1915 faced with several new threats released by the enemy forces. Initially chlorine gas and later mustard gas was released and soldiers didn't have the opportunity to 'avoid' the often lethal, but more often 'only' crippling chemical substances which attacked mainly their lungs, eyes, exposed skin and so forth. The most deadly effect was inhaling the airborne substances into the lungs where the lung tissue was destroyed and consequently the individuals blood could not get sufficient oxygen anymore and the patient suffocated. Sound familiar ? Most severe Covid-19 affecting patients' lungs and they often suffer from 'silent suffocation' and end up either in ICUs, get a cure or some of them don't make and end up in the morgue.
Soldiers in those trenches in e.g. Belgium had no choice but to stay where they are and put on their respirators , or those who weren't equipped properly often used a piece of cloth 'treated' with their own urine in put it on their face and covered mouths and noses as efficiently as possible. A gas mask is of course the preferred and most effective 'defensive weapon of choice' and the soldiers back in the days of trench warfare didn't give a rat's ass about how stupid they look while wearing a life saving respirator. 'Do or die' was the simple choice those poor souls had. Getting court martial and probably shot when deserting their lines, put on their gas mask or the gas will dissolve their lungs. A terrible choice during a terrible time of man made misery (war). Pretty sure that not many of those left to 'choices' thought about about 'not looking fancy. Nowadays respirators are still used in environments where toxic substances do some harm to humans inhaling those airborne substances. Even in the DIY sector it's common to use filtering face pieces when creating a lot of airborne dust during removing paint, smoothing wooden materials with sand paper or painting objects in rooms with insufficient ventilation. Inhaling those substances can make you feel dizzy, damage your lungs or will give you cancer much later. If more of those scientists involved in virology and epidemiology would do some serious 'do it yourself' at home they would know that it isn't a big deal to wear a FFP (filtering face piece) or even a somewhat more professional respirator with attachable separate filters.
Filtering face piece exhalation valve (valve not good for protecting others from getting infected)
Although those respirators can use a variety of filter units for different substances (e.g. for chemicals emitted from fresh paint during 'drying') only the ones capable of filtering particles are now of interest regarding the current pandemic.(and future ones for that matter)
"Two of us (A.K. and R.D.) have direct experience with that: We wore N95 masks for the past year as we cared for Covid-19 patients and neither caught Covid-19, shown by regular negative PCR testing."[Statnews,7.1.2021]https://t.co/E3YlqkvKqZ
We used a cough aerosol simulator with a pliable skin headform to propel small aerosol particles (0 to 7 µm) into different face coverings. An N95 respirator blocked 99% (standard deviation (SD) 0.3%) of the cough aerosol, a medical grade procedure mask blocked 59% (SD 6.9%), a 3-ply cotton cloth face mask blocked 51% (SD 7.7%), and a polyester neck gaiter blocked 47% (SD 7.5%) as a single layer and 60% (SD 7.2%) when folded into a double layer. In contrast, the face shield blocked 2% (SD 15.3%) of the cough aerosol.
The point is: When there is a substance in the air we can't avoid, we better mask up with the appropriate mask or use the proper attachable filter. Why using a simple piece of cloth which is just a miserable substitute when nothing else is at hand ? It was somewhat alright to use lockdowns of a modern industrial society when the virus struck 'unexpectedly' for those who don't have 'historic memories' , but it is not to be tolerated when ten(!) months later the industrial production for those simple filtering pieces hasn't been increased sufficiently or when the best engineers haven't been called by government and ordered to make a 'super mask' which is much better suitable for every day use than those FFPs used for a couple of minutes during DIY and professional construction. Are states like France, Italy, Germany or the Netherlands just agricultural nations or do they have different industries with a global reputation ? Do we leave the fate of nations to statisticians capable of correctly collecting numbers or do we follow the German example of offering the most vulnerable parts of the population the maximum available protection ? Now the Bavarian state of Germany is demanding that all citizens using public transport or visiting vital shops( other ones currently closed) to put on a FFP2 (N95 like) mask.
Austria has just announced to open 'business for personal service' like hairdressers , massage salons , nail studios and so on under the condition that service provider and client wear a FFP2 mask. That's sufficient for the time being , but we should aim higher and develop those 'super masks' as well and produce them in millions. Even if that will cost a few billion euros when 100 million mass produced fancy looking respirators with full communication ability costs 50 euro a piece, only 5 billion have to be paid (plus costs for distribution) in exchange for opening up the economies even before a vaccine is availabe for 60 or more percent of the population. Realistically it will take at least until Summer, probably until Winter to have achieved that goal of 'herd immunity' by using vaccines. We shouldn't leave those inoculated exposed to the virus immediately also because it's hard to differentiate between those who are immune by now and those who aren't. Wear a mask even when you got the vaccine is also the massage from Public Health England:
Stay at home unless for specific exceptions, wash your hands regularly, wear a face covering where appropriate and keep your social distance.#StayHomepic.twitter.com/fb03Hl0w6U
It's important to know that 'between' the science of virology (which studies the 'creatures' who cause that much of disease and economic pain) and the moment it enters the human body and starts infecting human cells in order to replicate itself in those cells and get emitted again for their next 'victim', there is their often neglected 'journey' on other particles. Those SARS-CoV-2 travel not on their own, they can't propel themselves, but they are occupying tiny particles of basically water and perhaps also human (dead) cells originating from lungs or other parts of a human respiratory tract all the way to mouth and nose. They are like passengers on a hot air balloon depending on wind and weather conditions determining journey until they decide (or being forced to) land. Those particles of very different small sizes hover through the air and just like those balloons can either move up by losing weight, the mass of those particles determine how long they can stay in the air once the exited a human's mouzth or nose. Like the balloon they also depend on the 'weather', so if there isn't any 'wind' they will drop to the floor in the vicinity of the human if bigger and heavier, or if it's 'windy' they will land some meters away from the infected human. It's more complicated once the 'virus factory'(human) is walking through a room when he/she is dragging a cloud of virus laden particles behind and next his/her head. It's getting even more complicated once the room has windows, doors or a fan attached to the ceiling or an AC(air conditioning system). The journey's destination becomes completely unpredictable even for virologists or medical experts dealing with the aftermath once the virus infected a patient o agree that he/she get's sick after some minor symptoms. Those 'journeys' can be modeled though by people who study airflow, particles and aerosols. Harmful particles can also be other substances, not just virus laden bodily fluids and unfortunately many other groups of people initially assumed that SARS-CoV-2 was 'riding' on droplets only. Droplets they are called because of their size and weight and therefore the likelihood to drop down to the floor very near the infected person in a very short time. It's a very different ball game once this assumption is wrong though.
Once this very very small virus is riding on particles much smaller than so called droplets they take much longer to fall down to the ground and they can travel much further away from their 'hosting human'. If there weren't such things like filters we humans would indeed be as in big big trouble as animals like those mink in their cages are once SARS-CoV-2 entered their building and starts infecting the first of their caged buddies. The difference between human and mink is however that we can invent/build/craft things that protect our heads from weather: hats or our feet from getting cold and/or wet: shoes, or our hands: gloves. We can make and wear stuff that protect us while in dangerous conditions like hard hats at a construction site, shoes with steel protected soles and steel caps, goggles for eye protection and - respirators for protecting our lungs. Humans don't have toi wait for the evolution to protect us almost immediately when we find ourselves in lethal danger, we can goi to stores and buy protection when they are in stock, mink can't ! Governments can get information from industry whether or not there are sufficient stockpiles produced or how many they can produce in a given time frame. Engineers and industry can be tasked to build something according to specifications provided by the government. They do it all the time for e.g. defense departments when they need a new naval vessel or a new tank or a new plane. It's not even rocket science as when they are demanding a new kind of missile capable of flying through air for thousands of miles and hit a target with an accuracy of a 3 Feet or so. A respirator isn't a satellite which needs perhaps years to develop and construct before it can get launched into orbit.
We are talking about some filters of class P2 or P3 attached to some kind of airtight mask. Made of simple plastics, fabric, silicone or other simple materials , not nano stuff requiring high tech science or complicated production environments just like computer chips made of silicon ! It's relatively simple, but nonetheless essential stuff for saving millions from death or severe illness ! Are members of governments the kind of DIY people who decide to paint a large object in a very poorly ventilated room without a proper respirator, because it might 'look bad' for a limited time once exposed to airborne solvents which will cause unconsciousness or lung damage ? Are they the kind of people who hope they will be found in time by next of kin who will then call the ambulance in time, or a they smart and just wear their f* mask ? If governments can't or won't see that we need to do more than just hope that sufficient amounts of vaccines will do the job, they are well worth to be called mass murderers. Unfortunately happens more often than we would like to think during other disasters where humans which happen to be at the wrong moment at the wrong place (the government) decide to sit idly by while others in danger require their action! It's not a choice between 'do nothing' and having millions of vaccine doses. We (our governments!) can also do something very useful right now ! 'There is no alternative'(TINA) is often used by either stupid or unwilling people ...
When industry is not capable or willing to deliver sufficient quantities of 'products against the virus' it's possible to force also competitors to join the 'war effort', just as the United States did back in the 1950s or to threaten to use it as recently as in 2020: Defense Production Act of 1950 [Wikipedia]
There should have been sufficient stockpiles of PPE in the first place, there was a 'surprise' situation and a shortage of supply of PPE stuff because the whole world tried to purchase that stuff in Spring 2020, but just waiting for some vaccine to arrive is clearly irresponsible negligence. Switzerland (as well as The Netherlands early on) is even going further:"The use of FFP masks is not recommended for private use." source:Coronavirus: Masks [BAG.admin,ch]
"Visitors R required 2 perform hand hygiene & wear a cloth-face covering or a surgical mask during-visit" "The resident may be asked 2wear a cloth-face covering or a surgical mask during the visit if they can do so comfortably but this is not necessary"😱https://t.co/NzXdi2dU2O
Ireland: Instructructions for care homes , source:HPSC
At least Germany and Austria are trying to provide help by mandating the use of FFP2 masks in either the whole country(Austria) or some states(Bavaria). Both countries also started to distribute free of charge FFP2 respirators for the elderly and vulnerable people. Just now the Austrian government has announced the reopening of parts of the locked down economy under the condition of the obligation to wear such a mask capable of protecting oneself and others.
Besides the existing, and often annoying and unpractical masks (made of fabric, filtering face pieces) it would be good for society and economy to mass produce much better designed respirators of highest filtration class:
Baselland bietet nun ab diesem Wochenende dem Heimpersonal wöchentlich Corona-Tests an. Dabei handelt es sich um Speicheltests auf PCR-Basis. Das Ganze bleibt für das Heimpersonal jedoch freiwillig.
English: just voluntary saliva tests for care home staff
¹ meaning ongoing research and public relations campaigns of 'usual projects' and repeating the exact same research done and published in other countries. Maybe for verification purposes but often coming to the same conclusions. Regarding children's' ability to infect others many mistakes have been repeated by several countries for instance. Politics ignoring research contradicting their policy goals and so on.
Funding now avail in CA for schools to assess their ventilation and repair - This should be done in EVERY State. Thanks for leading #California (again) https://t.co/1iwg7c2SwU
the most important
thing during an emerging crisis is to be prepared to act in a way to
contain or control it first and to overcome the crisis completely at a later stage.
The leadership must also be prepared for contingency plans in case
their „plan A“ fails. A crisis like the current one can‘t be
tackled by just one plan, it takes several layers of protection. "Plan A" seems to have been a vaccination scheme before a full blown public health crisis develops in a country. A race towards achieving "herd immunity" accompanied by some other measures, which were also not implemented the way Asian countries did.
Prof Chris Whitty says restrictions might need to be reintroduced next winter regardless of what happens with vaccine as that is the time the virus would most easily spread. Talks of an acceptable risk - like with winter flu - each year. There won't be a firm end.
4. Mask up. Almost any mask greatly reduces spread from someone with the virus. But to protect ourselves better, we may need N95/KN95 when indoors near others. A more infectious strain requires stronger defenses. Masks all the time when around others not from your household. 15/
The
protection of the population can‘t rest on one pillar only and it
should always be clear that humans can fail and therefore „backup
plans“ are as necessary as a multi-layer approach (Swiss cheese concept) to contain the spread of a virus. Instead it seems that many countries fail(ed) in regard of TTI (test, trace and isolate), a fully working 'corona trace app' & have implemented several kinds of 'lockdowns' (shutting down public life) followed by opening-up public life, with varying success. (ECDC's EU infection map colored in red or dark red) Mask usage was introduced often very late and only first being ridiculed by some. By now wearing at least a simple mask covering nose & mouth has become mandatory in public transport, enclosed spaces used by the general public in many, if not all European countries. Although the 'keep you distance' rule was introduced quickly, there are still some governments not fully recognizing the importance of additional safety features than just keeping a certain distance (1,5 - 2 meters) or wearing a simple, neither airtight nor filtering mask. There isn't a 'war effort' of mass producing equipment which could massively curb the spread of the virus, except perhaps producing simple cloth or surgical masks. There seems to be almost unlimited financial resources for compensating financial losses due to several kinds of 'lockdowns', but only a fraction of those state funds is needed to mass produce all kind of protective hardware.
My plan for beating #covid19 after watching this pandemic for one year? Easy: Test like a Korean, track and trace like a Singaporean, sequence like a Brit, crush the curve like a New Zealander, vaccinate like an Israeli - and behave like a human being...
It was planned to
release a detailed study¹ of several European country's approach and
failures regarding pandemic countermeasures, but since the epidemic
worsened considerably in several European countries, some articles
have been published which look more forward than backward. It’s
always most important to think about saving lives and not to discuss
every little mistake that was made and to seek ‘culprits’.
Speaking of saving
lives: It should be central to implement the most effective weapon
against the virus besides high effective vaccines, which are
currently not produced and inoculated in sufficient quantities and
which would take at least another six months in most countries to
cover 60% or more of the population. Vaccines are the ultimate
‘weapon’, but until reaching the point of vaccine induced ‘herd
immunity’ (letting natural infection spread would result in so many
dead people that the term ‘mass murder’ would be appropriate)
there has to be mandatory use of filtration. Either for rooms in the
form of air conditioning systems with so called ‘HEPA filters’ or
by using filtering masks of the highest quality possible, since we
don’t just have to tackle ‘droplets’ but aerosols.
A list of available
equipment and also some studies regarding their ability to provide
(virus free) clean air can be found here: technical solutions against Covid-19[EZRsecurity compilation, various languages]
It is
absolutely unnecessary to have discussions among scientists or
between between scientists and members of the public how to name
smallest particles emitted from humans through their nose or their
mouth. Whether to call a virus ‘airborne’ or using the
definition of ‘aerosols’ instead or as addition to droplets does
not help a single person trying to not catch the virus and develop
Covid-19 days later. It should be crucial to concentrate on the mass
production of not only ventilators for use in hospital ICUs once too
many got infected and develop the most serious form of Covid-19
resulting in lung damage, which needs to be treated with ventilators
or the patient dies of ‘suffocation’. It’s much better and
also way cheaper (100€ instead of 20-30 thousand euro per
ventilator unit) to mass produce relatively simple filtering masks,
which combine maximum virus protection with comfortable use during
many hours of the day. The single use filtering masks have some
known disadvantages and especially since the infections via ‘fomites’
on surfaces have been almost ruled out makes it desirable to call for
mass use of respirators made of materials like soft silicone (or a combination of clear plastic with silicone for sealing purposes) which
can be used all the time and just the filtering units have to get
replaced once in a while. It was noted by some experts that a
traditional (e.g. military) CBRN mask would not be helpful during a
pandemic due to its lack of filtering the ‘used’ air of its user.
That would be correct if not all occupants of a room wore such a
‘single side mask’, those who would not have ‘full protection’
could inhale the aerosols emitted by those enjoying ‘full
protection’, but who got infected somehow nevertheless.
A.) The risk of
getting infected despite using a CBRN Mask all the time is very small
and thus spreading the virus by using a ‘filtered intake mask only’
B.) In room where
100% of all people wear such a ‘single side respirator’ the air
could be completely polluted and still would all filters on the ‘air
input side’ of their respirators would prevent them getting
infected.
A military style
CBRN respirator is designed also to protect against e.g. chemical
aggressive agents or nerve agents, so the full face including the
eyes are covered either by some kind of ‘glass’. Such a mask
would be perhaps only useful in highly contaminated environments like
ICUs where patients have to be intubated by doctors and/or nurses, or dentists who are forced to operate safely just in front of the
patient’s opened mouth. For most daily routines a half-mask
covering ‘just’ mouth and nose should be sufficient, and where
it’s not sufficient it’s always possible to wear additional
goggles or a visor.
Such masks made of soft rubber like materials
such as silicone usually have also just one filter for ‘incoming
air’, but should have two for ‘incoming and used air’. There
should be one additional feature which is: a microphone which can
connect to either a small amplifier/speaker system on the person or
to a cell phone / tablet. Without a microphone it’s very hard to
hard to understand the muffled voice behind an airtight sealed mask
and two connectors would be ideal: one conventional 3.5mm jack designed to plug-in a cable and one wireless Bluetooth capability to
connect the mask via ‘pairing’ to other devices like phones,
tablets, PA systems, etc. When shopping a single filter mask
‘conventional’ mask for e.g. for DYI use or to be used in professional
construction work, the price of all individual components would be in
the range of 70-100 Euros. A two filter system for inhaling and
exhaling would look rather clumsy if those filters would be attached
to the mask in front of the mouth. A better design would be a
transparent mask with two 1 inch flexible tubes which would would connect the
flat mask to the filter unit behind the skull or in the neck or back
of the person. For persons which have breathing difficulties or
persons who perform exhausting tasks with increased needs of oxygen
intake it’s possible to attach a battery powered active ‘air
pump’ to the filter unit.
All those components
mentioned above are already on the market, just not as a ‘package’.
There needs to be some modification in the production process and to
develop such kind of new end product would not need too much time and
the components are cheap to produce and of much more use for the end
user and his/her protection. Those masks when made of the right
materials and with the right design can have better acceptance with
people who are now reluctant to wear a mask since it covers half of
its users face and make him/her unrecognizable and they are often
very warm and humid and unpleasant to wear. Especially annoying when
used by persons who also have to use glasses and those masks made of
fabric will reduce the vision of a user to ‘heavy fog’. Making
them not only uncomfortable to wear, but also dangerous because of
the reduced vision. Such a mask could also be used with a oxygen tank instead of the 'intake filter' on the back for use in heavily polluted environments or for patients with existing reduced blood oxygen levels like those who have COPD. Those masks can last much longer than the single use masks made of fabric and could be stored in households for any kind of future local or widespread dangers from 'house on fire' to dangerous chemicals released accidentally into the environment (once a set a suitable filters is also at hand) and could therefore play a role in protecting the general public from various hazards which now cost several lives every year. Why not provide the general public with a similar kind of protection level the members of the local fire department already have ?
Just a relatively
short text this time pleading for ‘filtered air’ either by
constant cleaning of a whole room or by providing individuals a
‘pandemic respirator’ device which combines safety with modern
design and which doesn't look like those rather creepy looking Soviet
era gas masks or like those white ‘coffee filters’(N95 or FFP masks)
covering people’s mouths and noses. It’s irrelevant whether we
call those ‘anti-airborne’ masks or ‘anti-aerosol’ masks,
just call them ‘overcoming pandemic masks’ - the most important
thing is that they protect individuals and society alike and are available in various sizes, so that also women and children can wear really airtight masks. (often observed footage of 'leaking' N95 masks during talk or work by e.g. female nurses). Clear, but airtight masks also enable 'lipreading' by people with e.g. hearing loss. People wearing conventional face masks often take them off (often for minutes) on public transport before drinking beverages, so the 'future mask' should have an airtight opening for a drinking straw, too. For immediate mass use only connector norms like RD 40, already available on the market, for attaching the filter units should be used ²
It's much easier to provide people with the right kind of protection than trying to control their behavior like keeping distance or not meeting more than X,Y persons for a long period of time. Socializing is human & (see: numbers published in technical solutions against SARS-CoV2) last, but not least there is the 'refusal factor' where a small minority of society simply refuses to cooperate and will thus keep emitting the virus, when infected. So the 'rest' has to wear highly protective masks. A 90% participation in containment measures by 'controlled behavior' isn't enough, especially when new,more transmissible ("UK" or "South Africa") variants have been detected in several countries.³
In case you are wondering about masks after hearing me on @BBCRadio4, they are not a magic bullet but benefits are very likely to outweigh any risks. Wearing a good quality mask well can make a difference. Evidence for some of the myths in here https://t.co/DuLwPlTBYj
[Christopher Cappa, Sima Asadi, Santiago Barreda, Anthony Wexler, Nicole Bouvier, William Ristenpart, Researchsquare, Jan 12 2021]
On average, the N95 respirator blocked 99% of the total mass of test aerosol from being released into the environment, while the medical procedure mask blocked 59%, the cloth face mask blocked 51%, the single-layer gaiter blocked 47%, the double-layer gaiter blocked 60%, and the face shield blocked 2% of the total aerosol ....For example, a 100 µm aerosol particle takes 4 s to fall 1 m in still air, while a 10 µm aerosol particle takes 5.4 min and a 1 µm aerosol particle takes 8 h to settle the same distance (Hinds 1999)....The presence of small aerosol particles containing infectious SARS-CoV-2 detected in these studies suggests that in addition to large aerosols, these small aerosols might play a role in SARS-CoV-2 transmission (Anderson et al. 2020; Bahl et al. 2020; Ma et al. 2020; Morawska and Milton 2020).
Advocates for the use of reusable elastomeric respirators have pointed to anecdotal evidence from users across industries, including health care, that reusable elastomeric respirators provide a more fault-tolerant fit—that is, a secure face seal is more easily achieved and less prone to human error than when donning and using a disposable filtering facepiece respirator (Chang, 2018). While the fault tolerance of the reusable elastomeric respirator face seal has not been quantitatively tested in a real-world setting, Lawrence and colleagues captured data on SWPF for both reusable and disposable respirators prior to and after fit testing (see Table 2-2). Their data show that prior to fit testing, the 15 reusable elastomeric respirators, as a class, obtained significantly higher levels of protection than the 15 disposable filtering facepiece respirators...
As always, @zeynep clearly summarizes practical info on masks. Material in N95s and surgical masks is good for many reuses; straps will go first. We tested filter cartridges from elastomeric respirators after months of use; they were still >90% efficient. https://t.co/TbEoTFpDK4
If we wanted to get serious vs B.1.1.7 —get N95/K95 masks to all and enforce their use —get rapid home testing big supply to each household for daily use —amp up digital, mobility, genomic and wastewater surveillance 100X —vaccinate 24/7 like it's an emergency. Because it is.
South Korea has mounted one of the best responses to Covid. Here's an example of the action the country takes to keep the virus out. https://t.co/FZz04gyb5R
Study showing probable SARS-CoV-2 transmission on Dubai to New Zealand flight, despite index case(s) testing negative beforehand. Sequencing suggests case A (& maybe B) infected C-G, despite mask use by most (but unclear if masks were removed for meals).https://t.co/9VY6s3Dlmbpic.twitter.com/Aug9Bl3zIH
The 7 passengers had begun their journeys from 5 different countries before a layover in Dubai; predeparture SARS-CoV-2 test results were negative for 5 (Figure 1). ... No passengers entered or exited the aircraft during the 2-hour refueling period in Kuala Lumpur.... The first 3 passengers to receive positive SARS-CoV-2 test results (passengers A, B, and C) were identified through routine surveillance testing on the third day of the quarantine period in New Zealand (Figure 2). Passengers A and B traveled together from Switzerland; both reported having had negative test results in their country of origin, <72 hours before boarding the flight ... Evidence of in-flight transmission on a flight from the United Arab Emirates to New Zealand is strongly supported by the epidemiologic data, in-flight seating plan, symptom onset dates, and genomic data for this group of travelers who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 .... It must also be noted that the auxiliary power unit of the flight EK448 aircraft was reported as having been inoperative for ≈30 minutes during the 2-hour refueling stop in Kuala Lumpur, such that the environmental control system would not have been working during this period.
For a while, the strategy in England appeared to have worked, with many areas that previously had high case incidence seeing rates drop sharply in November, including northwest England and Yorkshire, areas which had previously seen some of the highest incidence rates in the UK. However, it soon became apparent that the English lockdown had not had the same effect in every region. In Kent, a large county in the southeast, cases actually continued to increase during the lockdown, despite having the same restrictions as other regions.
Here's a great article by @zeynep and @jeremyphoward about improving our masks. Last year, it was important to get as many people to wear masks as possible; something was better than nothing. Now, it's time to improve our masks because of B.1.1.7, etc.https://t.co/Fv8UjBCTuA
Bluetooth Mono Headsets [Jabra, commercial] (just an example for the concept, based on readily available products, microphone integrated in mask with or without separate earpiece)
Lots of questions about KN95s. Their filtration efficiency is supposed to be similar to that of N95s, but (1) actual performance depends on fit (ensure no gaps), (2) fakes are a problem. I have seen test data for some that are <25% efficient. https://t.co/BZSmH4KPHn
COVID MASK WARS [Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, The what and the why, Apr 18 2020]
environmental hazards re disposable masks
Verheddert. Erstickt. Vergiftet. Falsch entsorgte Corona-Masken haben verheerende Auswirkungen auf die Umwelt und die Tierwelt, warnen Naturschützer. https://t.co/0lkZyQXtfU
¹ = just a few commonly 'incidents' during the last 10 months and in several countries, where high performing filtering masks would have made a difference: (talking to people behind windows/without inhaling aerosols/droplets isn't a problem)
mass infections & numerous deaths in some care homes
hospital staff getting Covid-19 and some of them died
medical/cleaning staff with insufficient/no masks infecting elderly persons in their home
bus drivers getting infected & some killed
children / teachers getting infected , virus spreads in schools/universities
virus spreads massively in some meat/vegetable production facilities
people demonstrating, without mask and without sufficient distance, against containment measures such as lockdowns & mandatory mask use
superspreader events during singing, praying, shouting during rehearsals, concerts, religious & political gatherings
Christmas gathering of care home staff (as usual)
Mass infections in prisons
please note: this document is based on the compilation 'technical solutions against SARS-CoV2' and a concept document sent to several European defense departments as well as to the European Commission March/April 2020. Latter document also making use of 'additional' knowledge of previous failed national projects pushed by various politicians. A kind of 'doomsday solution' anticipating that many politicians just can't solve very complex problems based on their limited knowledge of data, time for thorough analysis and also often the motivation to pursue the easiest path. A solution also based on the principle of 'distributed (non!) responsibility'...
