I deliberately made no comment on the necessity of wearing the respirator in the first place - that's a separate question. I'm simply saying that if you're goin

I deliberately made no comment on the necessity of wearing the respirator in the first place - that's a separate question. I'm simply saying that if you're going to the trouble of actually wearing a respirator, do it properly. As for the need for them - anything at or above the N95 respirator level (including eye protection) is only useful in environments with a high probability of contamination. That's mostly healthcare facilities with known C19 patients (particularly in proximity to aerosol-generating procedures), patient rooms, etc. EDIT: I think I may have misunderstood the intent of your original post. You said "N99", so I assumed you were actually talking about respirators. If you just meant surgical masks, we're mostly in agreement.