When I was reading up on the effectiveness of masks, I read about how just with normal breathing, the virus will be breathed out. And with the normal flu, even someone that isn’t sick will have a certain amount of the flu virus in their exhaled breath.
It is the viral load that will trigger whether you actually get sick or not.
Like you I was reading up on masks and why our government is saying we don’t need the n-95 masks in public.
It appears to me our government is trying to slow the spread down and keep the viral load low with hand-washing and social distancing, but recognizes that or hopes...our immune systems will have sufficient time to react to the virus. Basically, a slow inoculation of the population with a lowered viral load. Theory is if it spreads too quickly it won’t work and we’ll see systems overwhelmed.
It seems they see this setting up like the Spanish Flu, where summer brings a slowdown in cases and then it comes roaring back in the fall. Spanish Flu appeared more virulent in the fall because containment may have been too good in the spring leaving many people susceptible when flu season hit again the fall.
I don’t know if what they are trying to do will work, since this virus appears to be able to reinfect?
There are science several papers posted about this back in thread 6 I think? A slow spread of this across the nation might be our best hope.
Link to the study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2440799/
They even say homemade masks from tea towels to reduce the viral load are likely sufficient. See the end paragraph regarding being too restrictive regarding containment.