Are you saying that if 100% of the population got a flu shot nobody would die of flu?
Masks are a tool of some utility, but not an entire strategy or a panacea. Like hand-washing, technique matters. I last went to Publix on April 5th, the day after the CDC seemed to be changing its mask guidance. Because my local Publix seems to be uniquely stocked with people oblivious to personal space, I was watching everyone near me. I can say without exaggeration that I saw two people wearing masks correctly out of about 100 people I counted. Gaps in the sides was the most common problem, followed by uncovered noses, partially uncovered lower lips, and people taking masks off to speak.
I would worry that compulsory masks are going to be not much more than symbolic.
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I agree that human nature has violent, irrational, kneejerk reactions to some things (like make shift parking lot hospitals) and not others. (See: Trolley Problem). Thankfully, because of all the social distancing we’ve done, corona virus has not come close to our worst fears (though it’s still currently killing more people per day than any other cause including heart disease, cancer, car accidents, etc.)
The difference with corona is the worst case scenario, though. Even in the worst case, the flu never killed this many people this quickly and its worst case scenario is maybe a hundred thousand deaths over the course of an entire year. The worst case with corona, in the absence of social distancing, is over a million deaths in 2 months. I don’t want to become callous to that.
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Those issues aren’t really issues for the reasons they are requesting everyone to wear masks now. Yes, as the wearer, those gaps won’t protect you from inhaling it in from the air…but less of it will be in the air because the masks catch most of it, even with gaps, from ever getting into the air.
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If they change gloves regularly? Or maybe it’s mostly there as a reminder to not touch your face and not touch surfaces?
That’s my thought. Gloves are more symbolic, from what I can see. Unless someone has information I’m not aware of.
Nope, but that it could become exceedingly rare to the point that it would be noteworthy for someone to need hospitalization for it.
I vividly remember a TV news story from when I was maybe 10, about the last man in the world with an active case of smallpox. He was a cook from (I believe) South Africa. I remember him laying on a cot, smiling weakly, waving to the camera. For as awful as he felt, he knew that when he was cured, something that had been a terror for hundreds of years would quite literally be wiped from the face of the earth.
The hard and often thankless work of disease control and aggressive vaccination made that happen, not thoughts and prayers.
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Gaps in mask coverage also let aerosolized particles carrying the virus out.
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I’m not saying your wrong…only that wearing masks, EVEN WITH GAPS, reduces spread dramatically over not wearing a mask. So, even the most ill-fitting mask is doing more than none at all.
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According to the CDC that’s not true:
“CDC conducts studies each year to determine how well the influenza (flu) vaccine protects against flu illness. While vaccine effectiveness (VE) can vary, recent studies show that flu vaccination reduces the risk of flu illness by between 40% and 60% among the overall population during seasons when most circulating flu viruses are well-matched to the flu vaccine.”
It sounds like a 50/50 shot even the vaccine is at its best.
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Reducing does not equal safe.
I am still questioning this.
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Nothing to question. Hand sanitizers kill coronavirus (tested against COVID-19 specifically). This has been proven.
But, I’m not saying it is 100% effective. I’m talking about tools in the tool box. Things are better when you sanitize…but sanitizing along isn’t enough, for sure.
Again…tools in the toolbox. There will be no ONE technique that works in isolation. They must be combined to become truly effective.
And the only “safe” solution is 100% avoidance. But we have real lives to live in the meantime, so that’s not really doable.
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Doesn’t it depend on the ingredients or strength of the hand sanitiser? I have seen articles here saying not to assume your hand sanitiser will kill it, but haven’t read them since we can’t get any anyway.
The study on this specifically looked all several types of hand sanitizer, including the most common store-bought ones. They all killed COVID-19. However, you’re correct in the sense of HOW effective it is will vary depending on strength, etc.
But using ANY hand sanitizer is better than not using any.
The biggest take away was that you need to use enough to last about 30 seconds on your hands…and that’s where people aren’t doing it correctly. “Preserving” it by using a small amount reduces the effectiveness quite a bit. You need enough for it to remain wet on your hands for about 30 seconds to be most effective. Few people do that.
And that’s where I think it becomes problematic…giving people a false sense of security with it…like it is enough, by itself, to take care of things. It isn’t. But it helps.
Oh my goodness! We are currently fostering three little black kittens for our local Humane Society. My daughter said they reminded her of Merida’s little brothers when they are turned into bear cubs. So we named them Hubert, Hamish and Harriet. Unfortunately, one is a girl. They are so cute!
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Unless people are going out more than they normally would because “I have a mask.” I still think it’s a good idea to wear a mask, even improperly, but it could have negative side effects.
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This is true.
Sooooo sweet!!!
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Humanity is able to live with really terrible things. I always remember that up until the 20th century, 50% of children didn’t live to adulthood [1]. This is a completely surreal number to thing about, but, for most of our history, that was just life.
If it turns out that there is no effective treatment or vaccine for Covid-19, humanity will surely deal with it, it is nowhere close to the historical bad stuff. It will mean a lower average life expectancy, it will mean a lot of death and suffering, it will mean terrible economical impact [2], it will mean that basically everyone will end up losing a loved one to this, but in the end we will accept it.
But accepting the worse possible outcome without even trying sounds horrible as well.
We are social distancing, trying to buy time to get to a treatment (and later a vaccine).
There are hundreds of clinical trials going on right now, if one of them works out in a couple of months we will know how to deal with this. We already know more today than one month ago [3]
It is possible that it doesn’t work. That the time we can buy is not enough. But at least then we will have tried. And I am very optimistic that something will work, all over the world there are thousands of really smart people working on it.
[1] Mortality in the past – around half died as children - Our World in Data
[2] pandemics have devasting economical impact even without social distancing and quarantine, mass graves are generally bad for business and in a disease that can make people sick for one month even on mild cases is terrible for productivity
[3] What Doctors on the Front Lines Wish They’d Known a Month Ago - The New York Times
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