5 ms·
More here: Study finds N95 masks reduce risk of coronavirus infection https://www.livescience.com/respirators-prevent-coronavirus-infection-study.html https://w
by tristanj 7y ago
More here: Study finds N95 masks reduce risk of coronavirus infection https://www.livescience.com/respirators-prevent-coronavirus-infection-study.html https://www.livescience.com/respirators-prevent-coronavirus-...
As Wang's study revealed, rates of infection differed between doctors and nurses with [N95] respirators and those without.
Specifically, the authors examined data collected from Jan. 2-22 at six departments within the Zhongnan Hospital. Within the 10-day period, the hospital treated 28 individuals with confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 58 "suspicious" cases. The medical staff in each department followed different safety protocols when treating the patients.
About 280 medical staff in the hospital's Respiratory, ICU and Infectious Diseases departments wore N95 respirators and washed their hands frequently, while about 215 in the departments of Hepatobiliary Pancreatic Surgery, Trauma and Microsurgery, and Urology wore no masks and disinfected their hands less frequently. Although the respirator group encountered confirmed cases more often than the unmasked group — more than 730% more often — no one in the respirator group became infected.
In comparison, 10 people in the unmasked group contracted the novel disease, despite treating fewer infected patients.
"It would appear that N95 respirators, no surprise, protect against health care acquisition of the virus," said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious-diseases specialist at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, who was not involved in the current study. The small study is "reassuring in that sense," although there was no reason to think that N95 respirators wouldn't block out the novel coronavirus effectively, he added.
- chrisco255 7y agoI wonder how this squares with the fact that 2 healthcare workers in California treating a coronavirus patient contracted the disease? I presume they were wearing masks. See: https://mobile.twitter.com/skarlamangla/status/1234260334363308033/photo/1 https://mobile.twitter.com/skarlamangla/status/1234260334363...
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- onetimemanytime 7y agoOne mistake and you got it. Take out mask, touch clothes and then nose or whatever. Procedures are great for the first minute or two...after that unless you're super-trained and do that day in and day out, you'll make mistakes.
- testplzignore 7y agoThey probably were not wearing a mask. It's possible the patient never encountered anyone wearing a mask until the moment that coronavirus was considered as a diagnosis. My basic understanding of this is that it is simply uncomfortable for healthcare workers to wear masks all of the time, and they interfere with patients being able to see their faces (which humans usually like, even when it is a bad idea). I am interested to hear from anyone in the healthcare field regarding this and if there are any policy changes being put in place, even in regions where coronavirus hasn't (knowingly) spread to yet. From a layman's perspective, it would make sense to require every healthcare worker - particularly in ERs - to immediately start wearing masks.
- asdff 7y agoThere aren't enough masks in the U.S. to equip every healthcare worker for the duration of this virus.
- mikekchar 7y agoHaving spent considerable time at the hospital in Japan in the last few years, it now seems strange to me. Even my GP, In the 7 years or so that I've been seeing him, I've only ever seen him without a mask once (and I unfortunately get to see him a good 20 times a year :-P). Cultural differences are so strange...
- asdff 7y agoI'm referring to an n95 mask, but I'm betting in Japan workers are just wearing surgical masks. There are plenty of surgical masks in the U.S., of course. They aren't for this purpose, though. I'd assume it's for cultural reasons that surgical masks are worn that much in Japan, probably just makes patients feel comfortable. Surgical masks are to protect frail patients from your spit and snot, or to keep your spit and snot out of an open body during surgery. Wearing one won't protect you from disease.
- yodon 7y agoThat sounds like a study of N95 masks vs no masks, not N95 masks vs surgical masks. Another study reported here on HN compared N95 masks against surgical masks for respiratory viruses and found no significant difference between N95 and surgical masks[0]. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22456037 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22456037
- vonmoltke 7y agoThat's not really what the study found. It found "there were insufficient data to determine definitively whether N95 respirators are superior to surgical masks". That is not the same as "found no significant difference between N95 and surgical masks".
- ghostpepper 7y agoHow can they discount the fact that handwashing protocols also differed?
- tgb 7y agoSo the mask group was also competely confounded with being infectious disease specialists? Perhaps there were other precautions besides masks and hand washing that they were taking due to their training, even if not explicitly. Still interesting, particularly given the widespread appearance of "don't bother with masks" articles these days.
- TylerE 7y agoNo. Piling up multiple layers of a completely ineffective barrer does not make it effective.' It'd be like trying to use layers of netting to hold back the sea.
- npsomaratna 7y agoYes - that is what I noticed as well. The two populations have different levels of expertise re: dealing with airborne infectious diseases; different frequencies of hand-washing; and no masks vs. masks. There are just too many confounding factors here to draw a conclusion (in isolation) re: mask effectiveness. Edit: in addition, the departments used to dealing with airborne infectious disease may have had specialized protocols and policies that the other departments did not have.
- boulos 7y agoI do think that on a personal level, it was probably just more hand washing, the masks to prevent droplets and so on (that is, both groups could have done so, but the infectious disease experts are more likely to do so with every interaction). However, one part of your comment stood out to me: the infectious disease units also have higher HVAC standards than say regular areas (e.g., https://www.hfmmagazine.com/articles/3246-studying-airflow-in-the-or https://www.hfmmagazine.com/articles/3246-studying-airflow-i...).
- amarshall 7y agoMost of the “don’t bother with masks” is usually about cheaper masks which are not rated N95.
- jvanderbot 7y ago
- coconut_crab 7y agoBut N95 masks aren't cheap and AFAIK must be disposed after one day of usage. So they must be reserved for the medical workers, while the other can use 3 or 4 layers surgical masks, which should provide adequate protection.
- TylerE 7y agoThey are pretty cheap in bulk when not in the middle of a supply crisis. Like a dollar or so each.
- coconut_crab 7y agoStill 25 times more expensive than 3 layers surgical masks, which costs like two dollars for 50 pieces. Oh yeah and I don't live in the US so my definition of 'expensive' can be different.
- TylerE 7y agoThink about how many disposable gloves the average healthcare worker goes through. Dozens per shift, at least. Those are about 5 cents a pop, easily more than a dollar per day.
- rvnx 7y agoAfter 3 hours only :|