CDC considering recommending general public wear face coverings in public

Washington Post ^ | 03/20/2020 | Joel Achenbach

[Slainte]

CDC guidance on masks remains under development, the federal official said. The official said the new guidance would make clear that the general public should not use medical masks — including surgical and N95 masks — that are in desperately short supply and needed by health-care workers.

Instead, the recommendation under consideration calls for using do-it-yourself cloth coverings, according to a second official who shared that thinking on a personal Facebook account. It would be a way to help “flatten the curve,” the official noted.

Such DIY cloth masks would potentially lower the risk that the wearer, if infected, would transmit the virus to other people. Current CDC guidance is that healthy people don’t need masks or face coverings.

[familyop]

"Gee, if I can’t find a mask, what if I show up at the supermarket wearing a nylon stocking over my head?"

That's a good way to find out how many law abiding people in a supermarket are carrying. They're the ones almost imperceptibly smirking, looking sideways and each relaxing one of their hands. ;D

[familyop]

Yes, someone I know here has been reading for a few weeks about masks used during the Spanish Flu epidemic. She said that many of the people then wore four or five layers of cotton cheese cloth back then, because the cheese cloth was readily available but not woven tight enough for appreciable effectiveness with one layer. She also said that the Red Cross might have some history archived about that, because the Red Cross was issuing some of the information.

[familyop]

She’s also a millennial, BTW, one of the few very conservative ones with a general interest in all things old fashioned (especially tech stuff including textiles).

[ronnie raygun]

CDC needs to be prosecuted for the murder of a million or more

[JediJones]

Wearing masks is much preferable to shutting down and staying at home. Those people appear to be working or traveling freely.

[JediJones]

Try it at the bank first.

[BikerJoe]

Try it at the bank first.

Can't, lobbies are all closed. Only drive through...they take the fun out of everything :-)

[ought-six]

Oh, I have homemade masks; but my concern is for people who don’t have the means to make them.

[ought-six]

As I posted to Travis McGee, I have homemade masks. My concern is for those who do not have the means to make their own.

[Travis McGee]

Anybody can make these in a few minutes from stuff at home. Ain't pretty, but they work. If no HEPA cloth from HVAC filters or vacuum cleaner bags are available, you can use paper towels with a coffee filter in between.