If you had told me in January that we were all going to have such an in-depth knowledge of how we spray aerosol droplets from our mouths and noses in August i would have assumed you have been at the left over Christmas egg-nog but then if you had said i would be going on a Toilet Roll hunt in supermarkets i wouldn't have believed you either.
So we now know that every time we utter just a couple of words, we spray thousands of invisible aerosol droplets into the air in front of us.
Just talking can send droplets 1.2m, singing 1.5m, coughing 1.9m and sneezing up to 8m in front of us and there is growing evidence that some of the droplets fall onto surfaces but some hang around in the air just waiting to be breathed in by innocent bystanders.
Wearing a mask does not therefore stop you breathing in the potentially infected droplets but they do stop you breathing out quite so many every time you cough or burst into a chorus of Aga Doo which brings me to face shields which most service workers seem to be wearing now.
Sure they stop droplets shooting forth from the mouth of the wearer and stop other droplets hitting there own face, it even allows you to talk clearly without chewing on a section of cloth but they only stop droplets coming at you straight on.
With a sizable gap below the shield, the droplets have a handy space to invade and as they seem to be the protection of choice for waitresses, hairdressers and other professions where the shield wearer is above the sitting customer, it's an open invite for any passing nasty.
Any protection is better than no protection but i think i will stick with my mask for now.
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