5 ms·

239 Experts with 1 Big Claim: The Coronavirus Is Airborne

29 points by 9nGQluzmnq3M 6y ago

nabla9 6y ago
At the beginning there was 4 different routes were considered: fecal-oral route, touch-hand-face, droplets in the air, airborne viruses. Fecal-oral route seems to either nonexistent or incredibly small. Airborne (aerosol) risk has been considered very small. Two main routes are touch-hand-face and droplets in the air. It seems that droplets are the main route (60-70% of infections) rest come from touching things. Social distancing. 2m indoors and hand washing seems to work. If there is aerosol transmission it seems to be much smaller percentage than two other transmission mechanisms. Claiming that aerosol vs droplet transmission is artificial distinction is incorrect. Droplets fall down relatively fast and don't linger in the air 10s of minutes like aerosol. Aerosol transmission is more dependent on moisture in the air, they linger longer in dry air. We should see strong seasonal and climate forcing in transmission rates. Simulations of indoor airflow that show the difference between aerosol and droplet transmissions: (caution: just inhaling viruses is not enough to cause infection, you need to inhale a dose that is large enough to cause infection) https://www.aalto.fi/en/news/modelling-confirms-isolating-the-ill-and-prioritising-remote-work-are-key-strategies-in https://www.aalto.fi/en/news/modelling-confirms-isolating-th... VTT simulation with only droplets with and without mask: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YWuD4jdjLc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YWuD4jdjLc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-apLuN7sZc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-apLuN7sZc
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  I don't know how you square discounting aerosol transmission with super spreading events where one person infects dozens of people in less than an hour. Sounds like cover your ass nitpicking to me.
  - nabla9 6y ago
    Infecting dozens in a hour sounds like droplet transmission. Especially when the events usually happened when people were signing etc. People shed droplets when they exhale and speak. Singing is much worse. Aerosol transmission could infect several hundreds if it was significant transmission route.
mrtri 6y ago
fact remains, no medical study can prove the corona virus is dangerous for healthy people and is infectious Medical study: 455 persons exposed to a person with Covid19, non of the 455 persons became sick by the virus. Conclusion: very low infectivity https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7219423/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7219423/
skywhopper 6y ago
This article feels like it’s months old or from an alternate universe. We “may” need masks indoors? I’m very confused what is being communicated here. It sounds like a bunch of experts fussing over the finer points of established theory without considering real data about this particular virus. Presumably because they don’t have enough data, but then the focus ought to be on collecting more, not arguing over theory.
biolurker1 6y ago
10 points for this comment and 157 for the Bible api. This is not unfolding well even in the tech world.
- biolurker1 6y ago
  Downvote me religious fanatics.
  - kencausey 6y ago
    I suggest you read (multiple times) the 'In Comments' section of the guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - biolurker1 6y ago
      This is a world emergency, sometimes rules need to be bent..
soared 6y ago
The title while technically correct stokes fear more than anything else. The article goes into depth on how “airborne” is not terribly different than what we know now about aerosols hanging in the air. Most people will read the title and react at too large of a scale, while the only real insight should be that in crowded indoor places with poor ventilation (offices, restaurants), you may be able to get infected even when socially distancing. That is much more reasonable and solvable. Airborne is a overused Hollywood term that makes most people think it floats on the wind and infects you anywhere, anytime.
- nwah1 6y ago
  Some microbes really do float in the wind like that. But apparently viruses tend to get destroyed by sunlight or desiccated fairly easily. Bacteria are more complex, and become world travellers. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/living-bacteria-are-riding-earths-air-currents-180957734/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/living-bacteri...
sunstone 6y ago
What if masks give better protection against aerosol than droplets. So far it seems mask wearing has been unreasonably effective, eg Tokyo and Taiwan.
- tridentlead 6y ago
  Other way around, droplets are bigger and more effectively filtered usually.
mhkool 6y ago
Prof Dr Cicero Coimbra showed in an interview a graph that makes you think: with 18 ng/ml vitamin D levels 100% of patients with covid-19 die and with 34 ng/ml 100% survive with a line in between: so the less vitamin D, the higher the risk to die. He has a protocol to give a single high dose of vitamin D and all patients survive. The interview is in Portuguese and the graph has English labels: https://youtu.be/l_nKoLY60lY?t=911 https://youtu.be/l_nKoLY60lY?t=911

29 points by 9nGQluzmnq3M 6y ago

At the beginning there was 4 different routes were considered: fecal-oral route, touch-hand-face, droplets in the air, airborne viruses. Fecal-oral route seems to either nonexistent or incredibly small. Airborne (aerosol) risk has been considered very small. Two main routes are touch-hand-face and droplets in the air. It seems that droplets are the main route (60-70% of infections) rest come from touching things. Social distancing. 2m indoors and hand washing seems to work. If there is aerosol transmission it seems to be much smaller percentage than two other transmission mechanisms. Claiming that aerosol vs droplet transmission is artificial distinction is incorrect. Droplets fall down relatively fast and don't linger in the air 10s of minutes like aerosol. Aerosol transmission is more dependent on moisture in the air, they linger longer in dry air. We should see strong seasonal and climate forcing in transmission rates. Simulations of indoor airflow that show the difference between aerosol and droplet transmissions: (caution: just inhaling viruses is not enough to cause infection, you need to inhale a dose that is large enough to cause infection) https://www.aalto.fi/en/news/modelling-confirms-isolating-the-ill-and-prioritising-remote-work-are-key-strategies-in https://www.aalto.fi/en/news/modelling-confirms-isolating-th... VTT simulation with only droplets with and without mask: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YWuD4jdjLc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YWuD4jdjLc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-apLuN7sZc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-apLuN7sZc

Gibbon1 6y ago
I don't know how you square discounting aerosol transmission with super spreading events where one person infects dozens of people in less than an hour. Sounds like cover your ass nitpicking to me.
- nabla9 6y ago
  Infecting dozens in a hour sounds like droplet transmission. Especially when the events usually happened when people were signing etc. People shed droplets when they exhale and speak. Singing is much worse. Aerosol transmission could infect several hundreds if it was significant transmission route.

mrtri 6y ago

fact remains, no medical study can prove the corona virus is dangerous for healthy people and is infectious Medical study: 455 persons exposed to a person with Covid19, non of the 455 persons became sick by the virus. Conclusion: very low infectivity https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7219423/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7219423/

skywhopper 6y ago

This article feels like it’s months old or from an alternate universe. We “may” need masks indoors? I’m very confused what is being communicated here. It sounds like a bunch of experts fussing over the finer points of established theory without considering real data about this particular virus. Presumably because they don’t have enough data, but then the focus ought to be on collecting more, not arguing over theory.

biolurker1 6y ago

10 points for this comment and 157 for the Bible api. This is not unfolding well even in the tech world.

biolurker1 6y ago
Downvote me religious fanatics.
- kencausey 6y ago
  I suggest you read (multiple times) the 'In Comments' section of the guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - biolurker1 6y ago
    This is a world emergency, sometimes rules need to be bent..

soared 6y ago

The title while technically correct stokes fear more than anything else. The article goes into depth on how “airborne” is not terribly different than what we know now about aerosols hanging in the air. Most people will read the title and react at too large of a scale, while the only real insight should be that in crowded indoor places with poor ventilation (offices, restaurants), you may be able to get infected even when socially distancing. That is much more reasonable and solvable. Airborne is a overused Hollywood term that makes most people think it floats on the wind and infects you anywhere, anytime.

nwah1 6y ago
Some microbes really do float in the wind like that. But apparently viruses tend to get destroyed by sunlight or desiccated fairly easily. Bacteria are more complex, and become world travellers. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/living-bacteria-are-riding-earths-air-currents-180957734/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/living-bacteri...

sunstone 6y ago

What if masks give better protection against aerosol than droplets. So far it seems mask wearing has been unreasonably effective, eg Tokyo and Taiwan.

tridentlead 6y ago
Other way around, droplets are bigger and more effectively filtered usually.

mhkool 6y ago

Prof Dr Cicero Coimbra showed in an interview a graph that makes you think: with 18 ng/ml vitamin D levels 100% of patients with covid-19 die and with 34 ng/ml 100% survive with a line in between: so the less vitamin D, the higher the risk to die. He has a protocol to give a single high dose of vitamin D and all patients survive. The interview is in Portuguese and the graph has English labels: https://youtu.be/l_nKoLY60lY?t=911 https://youtu.be/l_nKoLY60lY?t=911