Estimated 1.56B face masks will have entered oceans in 2020

My 3M P100 filters incoming air, not outgoing. There's a valve for exhalation. I just wear a surgical mask over the valve.

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They are intended to protect yourself from the environment, not the other way around. So they come with incoming filters only. To change that, a retrofit filter is needed.

https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/company-us/all-3m-products/~/3M-...

In situations where a respirator isn’t viable or necessary a some masking tape over the nose bridge wire area is quite good for reducing or eliminating glasses fogging and providing a better seal.

Source: https://multimedia.3m.com/mws/media/433598O/european-standar...

Even as a one off, a single respirator costs less than three or four good quality cloth masks, and less than a months supply of single use designed N95s or surgical masks.

Few who have ever ever worn an elastomer respirator would argue it’s less comfortable than an N95 or less efficacious than a 1918 flu era cloth mask.

The exhalation valve filter adaptation could be cut and fitted with the craft skills of a five year old and took two minutes.

I’m not trolling but I think you may be.

(silicone is not bio-degradable, right?)

To me it kind of reads as "all documentation is bad documentation, just read the code".

You cannot charge the poorest people, those that pose the highest likely risk of contracting the illness, for masks that ultimately protect all of us.

There might be issues with reusing masks (I haven't seen any data on this).

This is more like one of those problems you sort out later and worry about it less when it's happening. The one thing I'd propose is do what we can to not use synthetics in them so they'll at least biodegrade.

Of the supposed total 5.25 Trillion pieces of plastic or 269,000 tons in the ocean[1], apparently 90% of that comes from 9 rivers, 7 in Asia and 2 in Africa[2]. And the rest of the world, essentially all of the Americas including the immensely plastic polluting central American rivers, Australia, and all of Europe only contribute 10% of ocean plastic pollution.

[1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/06/90-of-plastic-polluti...

[2] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/stemming-the-plas...

You do not live in a near-pristine area.

I see face masks everywhere, even in places where you have a trash can every 20-30 meters.

How hard is it to put the mask in the trash can or in your pocket? It takes no space in a pocket and you can put it in a plastic bag for an extra safety.

If you have to ask this question after having lived through 2020, it does make me wonder...

I believe a more decent question would be: is there any rule that people are not too stupid to follow?

There are two major factors that, as I understand it, drive the use of disposable masks in clinical settings. First is that healthcare workers see many sick people a day and they are worried about surface transmission. This is the main reason why they need to change their masks so often. The rest of us, who are moving through the world without looking directly into the mouths of sick people, have fewer foreign moisture on our masks. The second is that masks do become less effective over time, but the relative import of mask effectiveness should be judged proportionally to risk of the situation. Again, clinical workers are in a higher risk situation, so they change masks more often. The utility for the general public is lower.

Cloth masks were called into question early in the pandemic due to a 2015 study indicating they spread disease[1]. This was in a medical setting and, as I understand it (I am a layman) it was because of poor mask sanitation (i.e. using masks for many days without cleaning). My understanding is that using a cloth mask for a day is better than no mask. Of course it would be better to change it more often, but the relative risk is low.

Since then we have done a number of studies on cloth masks in the population and those studies have shown that cloth masks are effective[2]. It is true that "better" masks protect better, but that protection is almost always trumped by compliance. The mask you will wear is 100% better than the mask you won't wear. So health experts have focused on that.

The medical community has done a shit job of communicating this, but that's no reason to say things that don't seem to be true.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4420971/

[2] https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2020/06/417906/still-confused-abou...

Do you have any non-travel related examples where they don't also hand out said masks?

We settled on a public policy where we are only as safe as the worst mask an infected person is wearing. I would have preferred an alternative policy where people who don’t want to get sick simply wear an effective mask.

I do encourage covering the exhale valve, though, just to be extra safe and considerate.

EDIT: my bad, the justification is a 3% estimated rate for all plastics globally.

But based on this comment and all the downvotes, it seems the decision to not pursue a blog in earnest promoting the idea "That maybe we can find a better-er answer" was the correct decision as a means to protect myself from people who don't want a better answer, they just want a dog to kick.

I'm trying to say something like "Instead of promoting condoms and prophylactic drugs for HIV and other diseases while saying casual sex is fine, we could suggest (alternatives like) celibacy and monogamy as better solutions."

But I imagine that would also be just as hated on. Can't tell anyone "Maybe keeping it in your pants sometimes when not doing so could kill you is a better answer."

Edit:

TLDR: Maybe adults should aspire to more sophisticated answers than ones even a five year old could come up with rather than attacking other adults as idiots for (supposedly) "not seeing something so obvious even a child could dream it up as a solution."