Breathing & Covid: Changes at the CDC
By: Patrick Faith
Tags: Covid, China, Cdc

As some might have read, the CDC is slowly changing it’s recommendations. The “newest” masks guidelines are here: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/more/masking-science-sars-cov2.html

The major “change” in my opinion is now the focus on the Filtration for Personal Protection:

“Studies demonstrate that cloth mask materials can also reduce wearers’ exposure to infectious droplets through filtration, including filtration of fine droplets and particles less than 10 microns. The relative filtration effectiveness of various masks has varied widely across studies, in large part due to variation in experimental design and particle sizes analyzed. Multiple layers of cloth with higher thread counts have demonstrated superior performance compared to single layers of cloth with lower thread counts, in some cases filtering nearly 50% of fine particles less than 1 micron .14,17–29 Some materials (e.g., polypropylene) may enhance filtering effectiveness by generating triboelectric charge (a form of static electricity) that enhances capture of charged particles18,30 while others (e.g., silk) may help repel moist droplets31 and reduce fabric wetting and thus maintain breathability and comfort.”

They are still “pushing” cloth masks which I haven’t talked much about aside from me pushing everyone I know to the mask4all.org web site. But basically my issue with cloth masks is they are produced randomly. I do agree if someone knows exactly what they are doing and especially puts a folded paper towel/tissue between two layers of cloth … well they work pretty good. But really, who does that? I mean I even see people talking about mandatory mask usage in the USA, but the people off camera are constantly having the mask riding on the tip of their nose or have what I call “fashion” cloth masks which don’t have a good seal around the entire mask area.

A more interesting thing from the CDC was referencing some of the “financial research” people in thier decision making process(reference 42):

Hatzius J, Struyven D, Rosenberg I. Face Masks and GDP. Goldman Sachs Research https://www.goldmansachs.com/insights/pages/face-masks-and-gdp.htmlexternal icon. Accessed July 8, 2020.

This paper is solid and is also in line with what the Mask4all.org researchers were say (which are also mainly non-health statisticians). My hope is that CDC continues to reference the “money” statistics people, as in my opinion they give an independent viewpoint which tends to be valid at a macro level. If this financial paper had actually been implemented, then there would have been no GDP drop this year!

And the policy information was actually available at the begining of this year too, albeit in Chinese. I have often been emphatic on the Asian research which was excellent by early February, with research articles going years back. I even noticed Taiwan had translated critical research and policy papers into english early this year. I am a reader of Lancet, and they are attempting to connect US researchers with this vast amount of Asian data:

“It is our great pleasure to invite you to participate in a two-day event of The Lancet-CAMS Health Conference, which will be held virtually by Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (CAMS) and The Lancet on November 24–25, 2020. This multidisciplinary event is aimed to facilitate important global discussions about research experiences for the current global fight against COVID-19.

COVID-19 is one of the biggest challenges to China and the rest of the world, threatening economy, society, and people’s wellbeing. Under this circumstance, medical scientific research plays an important role in the prevention and control of COVID-19. As an internationally renowned medical journal, The Lancet has published a series of key articles from China and other countries, providing robust scientific evidences for the decision-making in global anti-pandemic process. Meanwhile, being the top leading medical research institution in China, CAMS has also made outstanding efforts during the pandemic. The Lancet always calls for global solidarity to respond the global pandemic of COVID-19.

At this conference, we invite top medical experts and researchers domestically and globally to share their researches and experiences related to COVID-19. Moreover, we hope this conference could strengthen the global communication and collaboration to tackle global pandemic of COVID-19. We look forward to meeting you all in The Lancet-CAMS conference 2020.”

I’m recommending all my research friends attend this. Conference info is at: