According to experts, as coronavirus increases, it’s time to ditch cloth masks – San Bernardino Sun
Is the omicron variant very contagious spread explosively and fill the hospital bed Across the region, health experts are urging Southern Californians to switch from cloth masks to stiffer, tighter-fitting masks to better protect themselves – and others – from Coronavirus.
“You have to be better shielded than before,” said epidemiologist Andrew Noymer, an associate professor of population health and disease prevention at UC Irvine.
“Faced with highly infectious omicrons, cloth masks are pure theater,” says Noymer. “They don’t do anything.”
The impetus to upgrade the face covering arrives after California officials extended Indoor masks statewide required effective mid-December in a month, until February 15.
In some cases, officials make the transition to better masks a requirement.
- Recent Los Angeles County Ask a K-12 teacher in the district wear a more advanced mask.
- USC students and professors must upgrade the masks they wear on campus starting Tuesday, January 18, according to a notice sent Wednesday, January 5, by university officials.
- Also on Wednesday, the LA County Department of Public Health asked employers who have employees working indoors, in close contact with people, to provide tight-fitting medical masks, surgical masks, and more. technique or respirators such as N95 and KN95 to them by Monday, January. .17.
- As K-12 schools in the nation’s second largest school district, Los Angeles Unified, set to return to school on Tuesday, January 11, Masks will be required at all times. It is outdoors as well as indoors. All district employees are required to wear surgical masks or higher quality masks. LA Unified kids don’t face the requirement to wear masks, but educators advise that “all students Wear a well-fitting, non-fabric mask with a nose strap. “
- Chapman University announced on Friday, January 7, it requires all people walking on campus to wear a surgical mask or higher quality model, as directed back to Monday, January 10th. The university said it would provide disposable medical grade surgical masks and KN95 masks. The decision came after a petition signed by more than 300 students called on the University of Orange County to distribute free KN95 masks.
Senior Daniel McGreevy, who founded the Chapman Mask Project and started the petition, said that “while we want to stay in school, we want to do so in a safe and scientifically clear manner that Better masks like the KN95 will stop the spread of COVID in a way that most other masks won’t. ”
What’s fueling calls for more effective face coverings is the unprecedented rise in infections amid growing evidence that suggests coronavirus forms small aerosols Russell Buhr, pulmonologist and critical care physician at UCLA Health.
“Aerosols can stay in the air longer because they are lighter and smaller,” says Buhr.
And, Noymer says, tiny particles get in “between the fibers of a cloth mask.”
Experts say higher-end masks are better equipped to block potentially infectious particles and should be used from this point on – even after the omicron wave begins to fade. Noymer said people are better off wearing masks “until further notice.”
California Department of Public Health provide this review of the mask’s ability to Preventing COVID-19:
- The most effective: N95
- More effective: KF94, KN95, double mask, full-fit surgical mask
- Effective: Surgical masks
- The most effective: Cloth masks with three or more layers of fabric
Angel Acevedo, who lives in Yucaipa and works in an office in the Moreno Valley, said he and his family wore surgical masks.
Later, during the holidays, Acevedo learns that he has been exposed to work. He wanted better protection and more peace of mind, so he ordered 4 boxes of N95 masks online, just before the end of the year.
Acevedo said he did it to protect his family – especially his mother, who lives with him, is 70 years old and has underlying health conditions.
“I don’t step out of the house now without the N95,” he said. “We’re in the midst of the highest level of contagion we’ve ever had, which I think warrants an extremely high level of N95.”
Anissa Davis, a health officer for the city of Long Beach, said that people at high risk of becoming seriously ill from COVID-19 or living with people who are sick should choose a high-grade mask.
Regardless of which mask a person buys, however, it’s important to wear it correctly — over the mouth and nose, Davis said. She often sees masks covering people’s mouths, but not their noses.
“Sometimes, they can get it hanging from their chin,” she says.
Dr. Jennifer Chevinsky, Riverside County deputy public health officer, said it’s important that masks fit a person’s face snugly and “have no gaps around the sides.” The goal, she said, is to let the air people breathe in and out go through the mask, not around it.
In a nutshell, Chevinsky said, “It all comes down to fitting and filtering.”
The more a mask fits a person’s face and filters the air, the more protection it offers, she said.
Buhr, a UCLA doctor, says there’s a way to check if a mask is filtering the air you breathe. When you inhale, he says, you should notice the mask “shrinking out a little on the face” or pulling it toward the face.
“That tells you that the air is going through the mask instead of around the edges,” says Buhr.
There was a time when health officials advised against buying top-of-the-line masks.
For example, during the early stages of the pandemic, Orange County officials advised people to leave N95 and surgical masks for medical staff and use a cloth mask, scarf or bandana instead.
Now, says Buhr, you should buy an N95 or similar respirator because the healthcare industry has enough supplies.
Advice has come in full throughout the length of the pandemic.
For example, USC officials, in directives for USC . students and facultyIt is not acceptable to wear scarves, scarves, scarves and masks. Cloth masks are only allowed if worn in combination with a medical mask underneath – an option that experts say will protect.
The change in mask-wearing advice comes as the number of confirmed coronavirus patients in hospitals continues to soar. Hospitalizations reached 779 in Orange County, 791 in Riverside County, 862 in San Bernardino County and 2,902 in Los Angeles County as of Thursday, January 6, according to state data. While not as high as the number of patients this time last year, at the worst of the pandemic, more people with COVID-19 are being treated than during the summer spike.
On Friday, LA County reported a a one-day record of more than 43,000 new coronavirus cases, breaking the previous record set a day earlier, county health officials said.
To make matters worse, the increase in omicrons is happening at a time when hospitals are treating many people with other viruses and respiratory illnesses, Buhr said.
“All the hospitals are really struggling,” said Dr Troy Pennington, an emergency room physician and urgent medical services physician at Arrowhead Regional Medical Center operated by San Bernardino County in Colton. . “Hospitals are filling up and they’re running out of space.”
Experts say Omicron, which is three or four times more contagious than the plains, is driving the winter spike. At the same time, the new variant is said to produce COVID-19 episodes are usually milder. While some feel comfortable about that, Buhr warns omicron is “not mild for everyone.”
“People are still dying from omicrons,” he said.
Staff writer Linh Tat contributed to this report.
https://www.sbsun.com/2022/01/07/as-coronavirus-surges-its-time-to-ditch-cloth-masks-experts-say/ According to experts, as coronavirus increases, it’s time to ditch cloth masks – San Bernardino Sun