Coronavirus

Same situation here in Connecticut. (I no longer wear a mask unless mandated to do so.)

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I’m here only on Mondays, Wednesdays & Fridays. That’s why I’m here now.

I was just in Washington and it’s the same there, I was shocked. Didn’t feel any different than Georgia. Of course , at least you guys were strict much longer and seemed to be smarter about it overall, so maybe most people are being honest.

A lot of this is due to the realization that masks did very little to prevent the contraction or spread of Covid-19.

I am not an "anti-masker." I still wear one where required, but I am a pragmatist. I believe in following the actual science as opposed to the popular opinion of the moment or the propaganda of politically-driven agendas.

Even Dr. Fauci said early on that the most masks do is stop droplets (this was when he first said masks are basically useless as they do nothing to stop the major forms of viral spread)...

The two leading causes of spread were; First; tactile contact (making hand washing far more of a mitigating preventative measure than masks), and Second; body-created aerosols (that come from a strong cough or a sneeze).

Masks did nothing to prevent these most prevalent forms of spread - at best they stopped droplets which were a minimal form of spread since they usually have a short range and are pulled to the ground by gravity (unlike aerosols which float on the air). If masks could stop aerosols, then you wouldn't be able to breath through them.

A great number of people who caught and / or died from Covid-19 (most likely the majority by mid-2020) had been avid mask wearers.

Masks have also been shown to increase respiratory distress in some people, lower oxygen levels, raise carbon dioxide levels, cause some people to have panic attacks or even pass out during exertion. Some studies now show that masks can actually increase the chances of contracting infections when used long term by trapping & building up particles in a damp environment close to a person's nose & mouth.

What masks did do is become politicized: they became a visual form of virtue signaling. (Another thing Dr. Fauci admitted at one point when he said masks were primarily "symbolic" more than anything else.)

What is this based on?

Several sources. Here's one...
https://www.ormanager.com/briefs/cdc...wearing-masks/

For the record: I'm not saying masks are completely useless (- again, they will stop droplets -) just that they are a comparatively minor mitigation measure (but they turned into a much bigger and more controversial issue via politicization and the fact that they are an instant visual signal).

No one knows if a person washed their hands or not - but it's easy to see if someone is wearing a mask.

Hand washing is far more important as a behavior prior to and after any type of social interaction. It is probably the single most effective mitigation measure when the most prevalent cause of spread was tactile. Cleaning of surfaces, especially in bathrooms & kitchens is probably the second most effective mitigation measure, followed by avoiding gatherings, close contact (social distancing), practicing overall personal hygiene, and then masks.

As far as the second most prevalent form of spread (aerosols) there is very little to be done to protect from them since coughing & sneezing are often involuntary and since masks don't stop airborne-sized molecules (which could include Covid-19 among other infectious diseases).

The best advice - stay far away from anyone who is coughing or sneezing, avoid gatherings & any close physical contact (especially indoors), practice social distancing.
If you are the cougher or sneezer - head for a door or window if you feel it coming on and try to cough or sneeze outdoors & away from others. Carry something to cover your mouth (again, as with masks, this will do little to confine or contain aerosols, but may help limit the distance you project them). Use your hands to cover your mouth or sneeze into your elbow (then wash afterward). Wash your clothes regularly if you've been around others, if you're coughing or sneezing or around anyone else doing so. If you have a chronic cough or sneeze, stay away from others & public places. Keep your orifices clean - brush teeth regularly & increase the use of alcohol-based mouthwash. Use a nasal cleanse & clean the ears with hydrogen peroxide on a Q-tip. Focus on a diet & supplements that boost the immune system.

And now, of course, get vaccinated.

None of these are cures, treatments or 100% sure-fire preventative measures - but they are things that may help mitigate spread depending on the circumstances, and slightly lower the odds of spreading or contracting the virus.

Now I’m confused. Didn’t they say last year that the germs didn’t last on surfaces & that the mass disinfecting of walls, sidewalks, whatever in China or wherever was actually useless?

Having said this, I keep a rather clean house & I am the Queen of Bleach, which is the only substance that kills 99% of germs on contact. So a lot of wiping down with this stuff, which I did even before the pandemic. I am convinced this helped hubs & I survive this horror. Like you said, kitchen & bathroom are always prime in our house for cleanliness.

I'm going by the reports that said the primary (most prevalent) cause of transmission was tactile.

So if someone uses the bathroom (without getting too graphic), then does not wash their hands, but touches the toilet handle, then the door knob (and on and on)... and then someone else comes along, touches the same door knob then unconsciously rubs their eye - they may have just contracted the virus.

So the main mitigating measures against the leading cause of spread (tactile transmission) is first washing hands, and then washing the surfaces any hands may touch to protect against those who forget to wash hands, don't wash hands, or wash hands in the wrong sequence.

Bathrooms (whether public or residential) may have a high rate of traffic, so even if germs don't live long on surfaces, they don't have to - someone may be touching those surfaces just minutes after someone else.

If you want to be really careful it's probably best to wash hands before touching yourself (so as not to transmit anything from surfaces to your skin), then wash them again after touching yourself or anything else in a rest room. And I don't think increasing face washing (since it contains the majority of the body's open orifices) would hurt either!

And yet, the source of the virus isn't really because you were using the BATHROOM. So, if you're not using the restroom but just aren't washing your hands while/after being out in public and touching things other people touched--whether or not they used a restroom--you could contract the virus. It all depends on where the virus is/was... and that might not have anything to do with a bathroom.

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That is a valid point.

But if I may get a bit more graphic - in the early months of the pandemic scientists stated the main cause of transmission was tactile - and the substance being transmitted by fingers & hands that contained the most virus was fecal matter. Thus the focus on bathrooms as a front line "danger zone" for Covid-19 spread.

(Of course, that transmission could spread to any variety of places by anyone who didn't wash their hands or anyone who did wash their hands but then touched an already contaminated surface - like a door knob. Once hands were contaminated, the tactile spread could go anywhere a person did.)

I've never heard of this site before and don't trust this source. What reputable source do you have?

The statement about increased CO2 inhalation and lowered oxygen is bull. I've had coworkers actually measure their O2 and CO2 using the monitoring machines we have for surgery and it had no effect on levels even when they were wearing N95 masks and surgical masks together.

Also, one of the big reasons why I continue to wear a mask is that it prevents me from absent-mindedly touching my nose and mouth with unwashed hands. It also prevents my mouth from actually touching the telephone when I'm at work (and the phones have proven to be a big source of transmission of cold/flu viruses at my work in the past). So to say that they don't do anything but stop droplets is untrue.

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I did say masks raise CO2 levels and decrease Oxygen levels (meaning in the blood).

This is a fact. Anything that covers your airways and does not provide an additional or alternative air source will change these levels. As to how much the changes effects people depends on the people; their age, their fitness level, the amount of exertion they are required to do, comorbidities, and state of respiratory health.

One article: (granted the conclusion is that the changes in CO2 and Oxygen may be negligible, but are within acceptable NIOSH limits for 15-minute time frames - what about longer than 15 minutes?)

The clinical implications of elevated CO2 levels with long-term use of face masks needs further studies.

https://bmcinfectdis.biomedcentral.c...79-021-06056-0

I thought most people who caught it wore masks, but my impression was that it was just because most people were wearing masks. I haven't looked it up, I just thought it was a given. Maybe I was wrong, idk. I've always been skeptical about their effectiveness but I had no problem wearing one just to get along. I certainly feel much healthier now that I don't wear one. During work, I had to take mine off a few times because I thought I was going to pass out. Of course I'm a smoker and that was during strenuous work.

But I feel like I've read several things like this: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-...s-shields.html

Or am I misunderstanding the science here?

I mean, I forgot I was wearing a mask at one point and tried to blow out a candle and it was a total no-go. So some air must be redirected/slowed, right? Maybe I just don't get the science.

When you sneeze you "atomize" fluids inside you. Not literally atomize (you don't break everything down to atomic size), but you turn liquid molecules into aerosols just like an atomizer.

The human sneeze is incredibly forceful (and yes, it ejects both droplets and aerosols). A sneeze is literally like an air canon and it takes a very concentrated amount of air under pressure to "atomize" fluids to basically turn them gaseous or able to be small enough to be carried on the air.

So the mask may stop the solid matter, it may limit the airflow both ways, but under a strong cough or a sneeze, almost everything contained in the sputum in your mouth and lungs that's turned into a vapor goes right through a mask - unless it's airtight (like a self-contained breathing apparatus).

Plus, sneezes are so powerful that they can force air out of the mask at all it's edges (again, unless it's airtight - in which case you wouldn't be able to breath). This is the same principle as to why face shields can't contain aerosols - in their case they are open either at the top or bottom and the vapors flow right up or down out of them. But with shields, you don't even need to sneeze, just normal breathing pushes your vapors out of them.

An experiment from last winter: did you wear your mask outside in the cold? Did you see your breath coming through your mask? That was concentrated vapor from your lungs, but it went right through the mask - Covid virus molecules are smaller than the visible vapor molecules from your lungs that you could see in the air. If you could see your breath going through the mask, than any disease molecules you might be carrying could go through the mask and be carried on that very same breath that you could see.

Turns out that's not how it works in practice, though. Early on people were worried for the same reason you're describing: a molecule can still get through. But since we've learned that that isn't enough, which is one of the reasons being outdoors is so low-risk. You need a significant amount to get in, and a mask all but prevents that if worn properly.

Amusingly, this cross-cuts against a couple of angles of the debate. In order to think masks don't matter that much, you actually have to think COVID is far easier to catch than it is.

Yeah, the study in question isn't worth much, partially for the reason you allude to here: it needs to be compared to the rate of mask usage among people who didn't get it.

That, and it's self-reported, in a situation where people have a clear social incentive to exaggeration. If you think that many people with COVID wore masks that often, you have to believe all the people who tell their doctors they exercise "often," too.

Right. What's called viral load is another factor - getting enough virus molecules in you at one time to get infected.

I've been talking about viral load in relationship to the outdoors from the beginning (on this site and others)... contending that spread outdoors (excepting DIRECT physical contact - like kissing for instance) is an extremely low possibility.

Bottom line - none of this is black and white. With everything involved there are sets and sets of variables at every angle you look at it.

If you agree that viral load in the outdoors is a low possibility, that doesn't really jibe with the other mask stuff. That's why the claim is kind of amusing: you either have to think the virus is not very communicable, in which case the masks obviously help, or it isn't, in which case they do.

Nobody claimed it was black or white, anyway. Nothing is full-proof in protecting people from the virus, but neither are we powerless against it. "You can still get COVID even if you wear a mask" isn't a reason not to wear one, nor does it mean masks are not effective. The evidence, taken as a whole, is pretty clear on this point. And it should be pretty easy to accept, since it's also a completely intuitive conclusion.

I agree and disagree. Masks help some. I don't know that any conclusive evidence has been supplied that proves they help a great deal.

I think what is more accurate is masks help some, but don't help others... and for some demographics (such as children) they can even be a hazard.

If masks helped a great deal, then I think we'd have statistics by now that would support those who wore masks didn't get the disease and by far, those who did not use masks got it much more readily. But the statistics seem to say the opposite.

Then there's the theory I've heard that I don't quite understand - some say masks work to protect others from the wearer, but can't protect the wearer from others. This idea says they mitigate spreading the disease to others, but do not mitigate contraction of the disease (which sounds kind of like the same thing). This means masks would only work in one direction - yet they are made of porous materials that let air in and out in both directions.

Maybe someone can help clear this idea up for me?