[glofish]

I for one doubt that home-made reusable masks have much effect especially considering that it is unlikely that people use them and clean them as required.

The surface of the mask might end being the a source of infection that keeps exposing people to the disease. I recall reading a research paper stating the especially the outer side of the mask had the heaviest viral loads.

While I understand the sentiment, I can't help but wonder whether these homegrown mask solutions only end up doing more harm than good when used at such a wide scale and so haphazardly.

I also understand that people really really wish they worked - thus any doubt expressed here is met with scorn.

[newacct583]

This is basically wrong. This has been studied, they do work. They don't work nearly as well as proper PPE for personal protection, which tends to trip people up (especially, it must be noted, the libertarians here) when reasoning about them.

But controlling outbreaks is not about minimizing individual risk. By far the biggest effect of wearing a simple mask or face shield, and it's a very significant effect, is that it prevents contagious individuals from spewing droplets into the air around them.

It's not for you, basically. It's for everyone else. Wear a mask.

[olyjohn]

I have been wearing a homemade mask when I go out. I understand the studies say they work... But man I am pretty sure my breath is just going out around all the edges. My sunglasses fog up as I'm walking into the store. And when I take them off, my breath is just going up around my face at a higher velocity. I guess it's not going towards other people though... the more I read, the less I know about this shit.

[kaybe]

Does your mask have a piece of wire around the nose? I find that really helps with the glasses.

[glofish]

All evidence out there indicates that continuous exposure in closed environments is what spreads the infection. Would droplets hang in the air for that long? Most likely not.

All the mask evidence is purely speculative of the style: "it has to work" - something there in front of your face, ergo the effect has to be more than zero.

Yet I will maintain that until a proper public health study it might just as well be harmful. For all we know they may cause asthma, allergies and so on. Breathing through a material cannot be good for the human body.

[jhayward]

This appears to be the most common misunderstanding of how public use of masks helps. They don’t help the wearer - they prevent the wearer from unintentionally being a source of infection.

My mask protects you - your mask protects me.

[rtkwe]

Masks to work (and to be worthwhile) don't particularly have to stop you from getting infected what the homemade versions are good for is stopping you from infecting others by confining, redirecting and slowing your breath as you breath out. It limits the volume that the breath spreads into and the first surface any droplets will hit will be the mask potentially capturing it.