As we open up our economies, the question of what we need to do to ensure that the rate of COVID transmission remains low is at the forefront.  Many businesses have adopted new health & safety protocols which include wearing masks along with sanitizing and keeping 6 feet apart.  However, the most controversial measure by far has been the requirement of masks by many businesses.  Many people find them uncomfortable to wear, they feel that masks increase CO2 levels in their blood and that the masks don’t do anything to prevent the spread of the virus.

As with many things about this virus, we don’t know enough.  It is a “novel” virus after all.  This is one of the reasons why health & safety guidelines keep changing around this issue as we learn more about the virus.  What the health officials do know now is that this virus travels via droplets released in the air from an infected person.  These droplets can be released when the person talks, coughs, or sneezes.  They also know that many people are infected but show no symptoms or show symptoms several days after being infected,. There is a possibility that they could be carrying the virus and shedding it without knowing via talking, sneezing, or coughing.  What the mask does is to possibly reduce the spread of these droplets from asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic people.  The droplets may not be stopped completely by the mask but their trajectory is slowed down so they may not travel as far to infect another person who is not 6 feet away.  Your mask doesn’t protect you from getting the virus, it protects the other person from catching it if you might be an asymptomatic carrier. Hence wearing a mask in public spaces makes sense as a public health measure to control the pandemic.