COVID-19: Face Masks Reduce the Severity of the Disease
Scientists had previously thought that the main benefit of face masks is the protection of the public from people who have Covid-19. But some researchers are beginning to realize that face masks can actually also benefit those who are wearing them. This is because face masks serve as a barrier that can reduce how much of the virus can reach the mask wearer, also known as the viral dose.
How can face masks help the wearer?
Scientists
have known for a while that the viral load influences the severity of
the illness - the more of the virus a person is exposed to, the more
likely that person is to suffer from a more severe Covid-19 infection
and the quicker the patient will start developing symptoms of the
disease. What many people, scientists included, have not realized before
mask wearing became commonplace, is that face masks actually help
reduce the amount of infected droplets that reach a person wearing it,
even if they are exposed to the virus.
There
are already a few scientific papers that back up the claim that mask
wearing reduces the severity of a Covid-19 infection. Scientists have
first observed this when they noted that positive patients who were in
an environment where everyone wore masks, such as hospitals, cruise
ships, and even processing plants were a lot more likely to be
asymptomatic.
In one study among medical workers, blood samples were taken for a COVID-19 antibody test that
shows whether someone has developed immunity to the virus. Many workers
who didn't even know they had Covid-19 ended up having antibodies to
the virus, which suggests that they were sick at one point, but were
likely asymptomatic and didn't know they had Covid-19.
An animal study conducted recently in hamsters further confirmed that a condition
similar to "face masks" (a partition between the cages of hamsters using
materials identical to those used in face masks) yielded in milder
cases of Covid-19 in the animals.
Certainly,
these findings bring great news because such a simple thing as a face
mask appears to be a very effective tool at bettering our chances of
fighting the dangerous virus with fewer complications and repercussions,
or even having an asymptomatic infection, even if we end up catching
Covid-19.
Face masks are a more useful tool than we initially thought
We
all know that we can protect others by wearing a mask, but the
scientific evidence we've reviewed above is proof that wearing a face
mask in public spaces actually has a greater value than we initially
thought. Not only can nationwide face mask wearing benefit you, it can
help make Covid-19 go away faster, and hopefully, for good. For months,
we've been hearing about the need to develop herd immunity against the
virus, with the UK's initial COVID-19 strategy
being the most prominent example. But countries who have been following
this strategy have been largely unsuccessful because many people ended
up getting a severe case of the illness.
However, widespread mask wearing
may be the answer to developing a herd immunity towards the virus while
we wait for a Covid-19 vaccine. The more people will get an asymptomatic
case of Covid-19 and develop immunity to the virus, the tougher it will
be for the virus to spread through communities, so people having
asymptomatic Covid-19 may actually be a good thing for the society. As
one review
published in the New England Journal of Medicine put it, “Exposing
society to SARS-CoV-2 without the unacceptable consequences of severe
illness with public masking could lead to greater community-level
immunity and slower spread as we await a vaccine”.