Mask Mouth - Dentists warn of increased tooth decay from using masks

[Amity Island]

Dentists says mask-wearing may be causing tooth decay and gum disease

The owners of One Manhattan Dental in New York City say they have created the nickname 'mask mouth' to deal with the burgeoning number of people presenting with problems.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Interestingly, back in March our chief medical officer said this about wearing masks.

Jenny Harries, deputy chief medical officer, said the masks could “actually trap the virus” and cause the person wearing it to breathe it in.

“For the average member of the public walking down a street, it is not a good idea” to wear a face mask in the hope of preventing infection, she added.

Asked if people are putting themselves more at risk by wearing masks, Dr Harries added: “Because of these behavioral issues, people can adversely put themselves at more risk than less.”

I do wonder if wearing masks in this way (e.g not once and thrown away) could be the cause of a second wave of covid19?

Face masks could increase risk of getting coronavirus, medical chief warns

'For the average member of the public walking down a street, it is not a good idea'

www.independent.co.uk

 

[mikeyB]

Not if you keep up proper distancing. And that is no reason to add more fuel to the ‘it’s not worth bothering’ brigade. Masks do not stop you getting coronavirus, but they stop the virus spreading from infected persons. A decent mask, anyway. I always use N95 masks, and always keep up proper distancing.

 

[Amity Island]

Not if you keep up proper distancing. And that is no reason to add more fuel to the ‘it’s not worth bothering’ brigade. Masks do not stop you getting coronavirus, but they stop the virus spreading from infected persons. A decent mask, anyway. I always use N95 masks, and always keep up proper distancing.

MikeyB,
I think masks definitely have some potential to help prevent the spread, provided they are used once only.
Trouble is, like Jenny Harries said in her tv interview, in reality it's not always the case that people take great care with their masks and this results in a possible increase in cases.
It is strange how although the science of wearing masks hasn't changed, the government did a u-turn?

 

[Bruce Stephens]

When you're walking down the street, few people are advising wearing a mask. This story [the one from The Independent] is from 12 March, back when the government was thinking, well, not sure quite what really, but it didn't involve trying to suppress the virus; I think they were still worrying about the second wave. At that time the government (and some others) seemed to be really worried about people buying up masks and causing problems for HCP.

The actual argument feels like something you might come up with if you really want to argue that ordinary people shouldn't be using masks. It just doesn't feel persuasive, especially if we're imagining that masks might reduce spread from infected people if they wore them (and so it would be good if a large proportion of the population did). (Back then the usual answers given when asked were variants of wearing a mask won't help you unless you know just how to do it, and likely wearing a fabric mask won't protect you much at all. That is, they didn't talk about what everyone else thought mask wearing was about.)

It is strange how although the science of wearing masks hasn't changed, the government did a u-turn?

Not really. It's just one of many, after all. The mask-wearing one seems to be that they think people might be less nervous with more people wearing masks, and so be more comfortable returning to work, spending money, etc.

 

[Amity Island]

Not really. It's just one of many, after all. The mask-wearing one seems to be that they think people might be less nervous with more people wearing masks, and so be more comfortable returning to work, spending money, etc.

Bruce,
Yes absolutely, and that's because the government did such a great job of scaring the life out of everyone in the early days of lockdown, they had to do a u-turn on their own advice just to find a perceived reason to reverse all the fear they instilled, so people will consider going back to work and school etc.

But given the evidence about masks not working in airborne transmission and actually increasing infection, why are they recommending them?

I think what you said about them being free to the public, say at point of entry to shops etc is the most robust way to ensure the strategy works as well as it can and like MikeyB said, to make sure they are decent masks and not just face coverings.

Also, in the British Medical Journal below, they did the first peer review of face coverings vs face masks. Their conclusion was this.

"Moisture retention, reuse of cloth masks and poor filtration may result in increased risk of infection".

"Penetration of cloth masks by particles was almost 97% and medical masks 44%".

A cluster randomised trial of cloth masks compared with medical masks in healthcare workers | BMJ Open

bmjopen.bmj.com

 

[Amity Island]

A decent mask, anyway. I always use N95 masks.

MikeyB,
That for me is the critical point. But... how many of the public are wearing a quality mask? in the proper way?
The BMJ peer reviewed study above shows how face coverings are 97% ineffective and harbour germs etc.