Surgical and homemade masks are much better than nothing.
/Thats basically a misinformation. They are completely useless, and if you dont change them each 40-50 minutes - bring you more damage then good
/Thats basically a misinformation. They are completely useless, and if you dont change them each 40-50 minutes - bring you more damage then good
https://blog.genealogybank.com/the-history-of-the-great-1918...
Evidence required.
If mist forms on my glasses from breathing, I assume the mask must be doing something.
I read a comment the other day on how many efforts are impeded by the "quest for perfection"
I know such homemade masks are not 100% proof. But even if they only work to reduce 10% of the risks if everybody wore them, than can be the difference between a R0 of 1.1 and 1.0 - and gives great results overall.
Don't just think about yourself. We are young and at no real risk of dying (0.1%, whatever). But we may cause the death of other people by simply contaminating more people.
Small actions are better than doing nothing when facing exponential growth
There's a psychological component to this. If a mask reduces the chance of infection (from daily contact) from 60% (random number) to 54%, I'm not going to bother, even though in aggregate it might make a huge difference. That's just me though.
Also, I suspect half-measures like this are only effective in the early stages of the outbreak. For instance, if the viral load required for infection is 10 units (completely arbitrary), and your daily exposure is between 5 and 15, using a home-made mask that filters out 50% of viruses makes sense. However, if your daily exposure is 100 (presumably because everyone around you is infected), that 50% reduction isn't going to help you.
It breaks down when people are in isolation, which many of us now are. You are not out daily, so a 50% reduction is a 50% reduction, and with luck you never accumulate enough to get sick.
If everyone wore masks, then every ones daily exposure would drop dramatically. You get 50% less intake, and infected people are emitting much less too. You have pretty much eliminated air born transmission, and can now focus on hands and eyes.
Same with masks, they are not perfect, they could be miss-handled, yet they provide some degree of safety and are better than nothing.... otherwise why would health officials wear them at all?
That just means the mask doesn't fit well, and air is going in and out the top instead of through.