1. This was the point of my original post. States should begin stimulating large scale production of masks and filters to provide most people with such masks.
2. No they don’t. Virus particles on the filter stay there as long as the filter does not get wet and decay quite quickly
3. Your mask either does not fit right or is low quality or has some kind of gas combination filter with very high flow resistance.
Regarding point 2, how sure are you? Why are we even trying to disinfect N95 masks if that’s true? I think your point is plausible but the filter technology in these masks isn’t entirely trivial. Most filter materials actually depend on a static electric charge in the polypropylene to filter properly. Does the charge actually release the active virus particles after some time, and then you breathe them in? I have no idea. I was already surprised to find out that masks simply aren’t just a dense material that filters particles, but a bit more complicated.
Pretty sure. You should not get your filter wet though since this may allow diffusion across the filter, which is why it is unsafe to wear (N 95 or other) fleece masks for extended periods. Also stuff that is bound in the filter is also attracted via Van-der-Waals forces which are really strong on this scale.
1. This was the point of my original post. States should begin stimulating large scale production of masks and filters to provide most people with such masks.
2. No they don’t. Virus particles on the filter stay there as long as the filter does not get wet and decay quite quickly
3. Your mask either does not fit right or is low quality or has some kind of gas combination filter with very high flow resistance.
4. Yes, see discussion above.
Regarding point 2, how sure are you? Why are we even trying to disinfect N95 masks if that’s true? I think your point is plausible but the filter technology in these masks isn’t entirely trivial. Most filter materials actually depend on a static electric charge in the polypropylene to filter properly. Does the charge actually release the active virus particles after some time, and then you breathe them in? I have no idea. I was already surprised to find out that masks simply aren’t just a dense material that filters particles, but a bit more complicated.
Pretty sure. You should not get your filter wet though since this may allow diffusion across the filter, which is why it is unsafe to wear (N 95 or other) fleece masks for extended periods. Also stuff that is bound in the filter is also attracted via Van-der-Waals forces which are really strong on this scale.