Paphos Life

With the reversal of the benefits of wearing face masks and speculation that the government may make wearing a face mask mandatory outside , I repeat my my question of a few weeks ago...where can you obtain these items...when we were being told they offered little or no protection against , they were impossible to find..now it is a must have item , who knows how and when they will be readily available.

Reesy wrote: ↑Fri Apr 03, 2020 6:39 pm With the reversal of the benefits of wearing face masks and speculation that the government may make wearing a face mask mandatory outside , I repeat my my question of a few weeks ago...where can you obtain these items...when we were being told they offered little or no protection against , they were impossible to find..now it is a must have item , who knows how and when they will be readily available.

Can you post the source of us having to wear this 'Must have item' ie a mask..
There are a lot of scare stories going around like the one the other day that only one person was allowed in a car

Today ...Senior government adviser Leondios Kostrikis...Quote” it is imperative to wear face masks in public places “ ...seems common sense to me that wearing a mask can only be positive. What harm can it do?

From the World Health Organisation ...

https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease ... -use-masks

When to use a mask

If you are healthy, you only need to wear a mask if you are taking care of a person with suspected 2019-nCoV infection.

Wear a mask if you are coughing or sneezing.

Masks are effective only when used in combination with frequent hand-cleaning with alcohol-based hand rub or soap and water.

If you wear a mask, then you must know how to use it and dispose of it properly.

Us blokes are ok .

https://youtu.be/gLuEE7nF9CA

For the ladies:

I posted a link - but Dominic's is far better so I have removed it.

This was posted on the Paphos Chat Facebook Group:

We bought ours on Ebay quite some time ago but only bought a few because at that time they were thought not to be particularly effective. We wear them + gloves when we go into supermarkets because, apart from anything else, I think it makes other people feel more comfortable IMHO.

I just wear gloves and dump them on the way out

one nose drip or sneeze behind or in front of a mask and it must be changed. They don't last for ever.

Happy in Cyprus wrote: ↑Sat Apr 04, 2020 11:12 am Cortrect, most are single-use. And if they get moist from breathing in and out on a prolongued basis, surely that makes it easier for virus/bacteria to stick to the mask?

You could reuse them after heating them to 70 deg Celsius for 15 min (I do that in my thermofan).

There are washable ones on the market. Amazon UK are almost entirely sold out but on eBay you can get them for the 11th April..........from China lol

Regarding home-made masks I was intrigued by how effective they might be as most are made, or the designs are put out, by amateurs, probably without any medical training.

Anyway, I have some dust masks of the DIY type that you do see being worn so I went looking for particle sizes.

The dust monitoring that Cyprus carrys out and publishes is for dust particles of 10µm and 2.5µm. From wikipedia surgical masks have to be approved in America and one of the tests is using 0.1µm spheres. That is 25 times and 100 times smaller than the dust particles!

This would suggest that dust masks are not a suitable alternative to the real thing and it would also suggest that if Cyprus is to make them mandatory then advice should be given as to what is a suitable material to make your own.

Mighty Sprite wrote: ↑Sat Apr 04, 2020 4:42 pm This would suggest that dust masks are not a suitable alternative to the real thing and it would also suggest that if Cyprus is to make them mandatory then advice should be given as to what is a suitable material to make your own.

They won´t protect you from catching the virus via aerosol droplets but they they offer some level of protection against you infecting others in case you´re infected (which you might not even know)-

If the wearing of masks is to be made mandatory then the powers that be must make suitable masks available to be purchased in sufficient quantities to cover walking dogs, exercising, shopping etc. which are allowed under present regulations. It is not sufficient just to make an announcement without the back up. That would cause a lot of stress with the minimum of results. They must think things through.
Full enforcement of penalties of multiple person gatherings without separation would be more effective.

If masks were mandatory, how could anyone check whether they had never been worn before. Somebody should invent a mask that, say, changes colour after being exposed to humid respiration after n hours of use. I'd guess that many masks we see have been used for several days and are probably much more dangerous than no mask to the wearer and, to a smaller extent, to those speaking with the wearer.

Devil wrote: ↑Sat Apr 04, 2020 6:08 pm If masks were mandatory, how could anyone check whether they had never been worn before. Somebody should invent a mask that, say, changes colour after being exposed to humid respiration after n hours of use. I'd guess that many masks we see have been used for several days and are probably much more dangerous than no mask to the wearer and, to a smaller extent, to those speaking with the wearer.

You could use a selfmade mask from washable material so it can be reused. Or simply wear a burkha

Happy in Cyprus wrote: ↑Sat Apr 04, 2020 7:00 pm Ah, but that's what politicians do all the time; bring out knee-jerk legislation without thinking things through. Closing supermarkets on Sunday is another example.

What? Are supermarkets now closed on Sundays?

Yes.

What the ‘;experts’ fail to say about mask wearing, is that someone who is contagious and wearing a mask, will not sneeze, cough or blow over you, thereby preventing much of the spread. Forget the protection aspect.