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https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/need-to-talk-more-about-reducing-covid19-exposures-rcna28753>
"World leaders gathered at a virtual global Covid-19 summit Thursday to discuss
the next steps in a pandemic that has killed approximately 15 million people to
date and disrupted the lives of everyone around the world. The event coincided
with the U.S. officially marking 1 million deaths from Covid, emphasizing the
toll that the virus has taken and the need for continued action to reduce
health risks in the future.
The summit led to a commitment for $3.2 billion in additional funds centered on
global vaccine access, with additional financial commitments to support
equitable access to testing and treatments as well as future pandemic
preparedness. But it is notable what was not a prominent element in the
financial commitments: resources and strategies to reduce exposures for the
current pandemic.
Of course, it is important to provide equitable global access to vaccines and
treatments, so we can reduce the worst outcomes from infection. But if we don’t
also invest in reducing exposures, we will have many more cases to deal with
and an increased likelihood of new variants that may elude our available
vaccines and treatments. And if we address exposures in the wrong way, we may
invest a lot of money doing things that don’t help, or we may take
unnecessarily aggressive steps that have adverse societal consequences.
This conversation needs to start with the fact that SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that
leads to Covid-19) is airborne. As has been discussed elsewhere, groups like
the World Health Organization were very slow to recognize that Covid-19 is
predominantly transmitted through smaller aerosols rather than larger droplets
or contaminated surfaces (fomites). While this may seem like a minor
distinction, it has profound consequences for how you reduce exposure. If
droplets and fomites drove transmission, you would be well protected with a
surgical mask, and six feet of distance would be protective. You would also
conclude that wiping down surfaces is a key intervention and measures like
partitions in schools or workplaces are reasonable ideas. But with aerosols,
small particles suspended in the air, these strategies don’t work. Aerosols can
linger in the air indoors for a long time, can sneak around gaps in masks, and
plexiglass partitions can actually make things worse by trapping aerosols. This
is why it is not surprising that masks reduced Covid in schools but desk
shields actually increased risk."
Via Doug Senko, who wrote "This is an excellent analysis of what we should be
doing to drastically reducing COVID. It’s all about the ventilation."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
