You're both right, but you're also both wrong. There's a big difference between protection for the user and protection for others; surgeons aren't wearing masks for their protection, it's for the patient. Surgical masks are actually a great example of something that has little protection factor for the wearer, but is effective at protecting someone else in the room. There's also a big difference between a cheap, single layer, polyester gaiter and an N95 (Unreal has been trying to point this out for like 1,000 pages). I am under no illusion that my cloth mask, over my bearded face is providing me with any real protection, but it will greatly reduce any spread of virus if I happen to be a carrier. Particle size isn't super relevant if the particles are borne in a suspension; if the mask can stop or slow the droplets or vapor, it's helping.
Thank you for this explanation. I was already cooking up my own in response to the mask comment when I came up on your comment.
To say it will greatly reduce the spread is wrong. COVID particulate size ranges from .06 to 1.4 microns. Based upon CDC data on their page cloth masks stop micron size of 20-30 microns and larger but slow microns aerosols down to 10 microns. Multi-layer cloth masks can both block up to 50-70% of these fine droplets and particles3,14 and limit the forward spread of those that are not captured.
Are you really that fucking stupid? It is simple math really. .06 to 1.4 microns is less than (or smaller if you need help) than 10 microns for aerosols or 20-30microns or larger. No cherry picking here you just do not like the science. It is very clear, the virus itself is much smaller than the protection offer in cloth masks which means it can and will get through face coverings.
This is what happens when someone half understands something and gets adamant. Unfortunately, most of the thread's arguments stem from half understandings and half truths, such as this.
Yes, you are right. 0.06-1.4um is smaller than 20-30um. But saying that the masks don't stop these droplets
at all, is incorrect. If you shot a single COVID droplet through the gaps in the cloth weave, then yes, it would slip right through -- nothin' but net. But a cough or a sneeze or even a simple breath is so much more complicated than that. It's an incredibly turbulent expulsion of gas, and droplets
will get caught on the mask fibers. Some droplets will slip through, but cloth masks do a decent job at catching a large amount of them -- N95s and PM2.5 filters do an even better job. Even the source you yourself posted says that a multi-layer cloth mask can catch up to 50-70% of fine droplets and up to 50% of ultrafine droplets, <1um. At that microscopic level, it isn't like a single fish slipping through a gap in a net. At the micron level, each individual cloth fiber looks like giant, snarling seaweed trap and the tiny particles do stick to the fibers when they come in contact -- they do not bounce off.
No one ever said that masks completely stop COVID droplets from escaping -- not a single person with a medical degree has ever said this.
The entire point is to inhibit the spread, which masks are proven to do. 30%-50% of droplets escaped is markedly better than 100% of them escaping, wouldn't you agree? Masks work when we ALL wear them. Masks are not for personal protection, they're for protection of others.