DO NOT Wear A Surgical Mask UNLESS...

Staying on the topic of masks (see OB, I can play nice and not  ) the US CDC agency has reversed itself on masks.  They now say to wear a mask so as to not spread the virus to others if you are infected but asymptomatic.  They say not to use the N-95, but that is because of scarcity and to save the supply for health care providers.  Cloth masks like those worn by Vietnamese motorbike riders are becoming popular with the change in official advice.  My wife made several to send to my brother in NY city and more for the local Buddhist pagoda.

THIGV wrote:

Kurterino wrote:

I could be wrong, but I think the word ‘widget’ was used incorrectly here. I only know it from IT, it’s a word for little helper apps that show up on the desktop of your operating system. It’s a relatively new word[emphasis mine] and a contraction of ‘window’ and ‘gadget’; a window gadget.

Exactly how young are you?      If you were alive before 1980, you would know that the word existed before the advent of computers.

Unfortunately I’m not that young , but I should definitely have looked it up before posting (English isn’t my first language). I’ve seen the word so many times before, and only in IT context, that i was pretty sure about it (but I did say I could be wrong...)

Markdgal wrote:

Even with these new numbers the fatality rate is still lower than SARS or MERS. But it is higher than the seasonal flu. The actual rates are from CDC and WHO. These is a lot of disagreement about how to calculate the number of cases confirmed, number of recovered cases and the number of deaths. Statistics can be fooling....
....Take it seriously but no panic button yet.

Winner post that still applies today

We have no idea how many people have been infected, only how many confirmed cases, that meaning death rates are massively exaggerated to the point of them being totally useless for everyone except newspapers that want to print scare stories, and politicians trying to get some idiotic political gain against their opponents or whatever country they happen to dislike.

We don't know now, and will never know, so no point worrying about 4 or 10 percent death rates because they aren't true, only guesses that are based on wild speculation.

Fred wrote:

Markdgal wrote:

Even with these new numbers the fatality rate is still lower than SARS or MERS. But it is higher than the seasonal flu. The actual rates are from CDC and WHO. These is a lot of disagreement about how to calculate the number of cases confirmed, number of recovered cases and the number of deaths. Statistics can be fooling....
....Take it seriously but no panic button yet.

Winner post that still applies today

We have no idea how many people have been infected, only how many confirmed cases, that meaning death rates are massively exaggerated to the point of them being totally useless for everyone except newspapers that want to print scare stories, and politicians trying to get some idiotic political gain against their opponents or whatever country they happen to dislike.

We don't know now, and will never know, so no point worrying about 4 or 10 percent death rates because they aren't true, only guesses that are based on wild speculation.

It is odd that the number of claimed Covid deaths far exceeds the number of those that have been tested. So how do they know they died from it ?

THIGV wrote:

Staying on the topic of masks (see OB, I can play nice and not  ) the US CDC agency has reversed itself on masks.  They now say to wear a mask so as to not spread the virus to others if you are infected but asymptomatic.  They say not to use the N-95, but that is because of scarcity and to save the supply for health care providers.  Cloth masks like those worn by Vietnamese motorbike riders are becoming popular with the change in official advice.  My wife made several to send to my brother in NY city and more for the local Buddhist pagoda.

So the surgical masks previously worn by medical professionals is now worn by the general public, and the N-95 masks previously worn by general public is now worn by medical professionals? Mind you, with good reason.i.e. better protection for medical professionals as they are heavily exposed to COVID-19.

P.s. take it the cloth mask is more durable than the surgical mask? (Cloth one can be washed and reused?)

sanooku wrote:

So the surgical masks previously worn by medical professionals is now worn by the general public, and the N-95 masks previously worn by general public is now worn by medical professionals? Mind you, with good reason.i.e. better protection for medical professionals as they are heavily exposed to COVID-19.

That is correct.  The primary reason in the past for the traditional pleated paper based surgical mask was to keep the doctors and nurses from infecting patients particularly during invasive surgery, not the other way around.  Think of all the TV shows you have seen where the doctor pulls down his mask as soon as he steps away from the operating table.  They are good for keeping things in, but rather poor for keeping things out.   Although some were always sold for medical use, most prior usage of N-95 masks was industrial and agricultural.  Recently some large supplies were declared OK by the US government for use in hospitals even though they had been packaged for industrial use.  When I worked in farming, I preferred powdered Lannate (Methomyl) insecticide in water soluble packets over the rather volatile liquid formulation because my employees and I could use the N-95 instead of a heavy canister respirator.  I bought them in a welding supply outlet.

One good combination is the pleated paper with the cloth "motorbike" mask over it, which I think I read gets you close to 80% on incoming air.  The cloth mask keeps the paper mask tight to the face which is the major failing of the pleated masks.  They tend to open up on the sides.