There are a lot of different shapes for N95. It is hard to find a pattern to fit all. I think wearing a face shield is a better solution and much easier to clean as well.
I am so pleased to see âSaving the Maskâ is accepting pre-order in Hong Kong (ETA end of April). Below is the final design and the product is called MaskSaver⢠(FB page in traditional Chinese). Now, the filters are on both sides with wider holes to improve breathability. Reported by HKet (in traditional Chineses) on 26 March 2020.
Standards:
- Filter used: EN-149ăFFP2/3 (EU standard)
- Submitted for GB 2626-2006 certification
- Inner/outer layer: recommended use 0.5mm food-grade plastic
The product includes a mask with 60 filters (ie 30 days usage). Recommended retail price is HKD68 (at exchange rate 7.8 eqv to USD8.72 or USD0.30/day!!!). It is a not-for-profit initiative.
PS: I donât have any financial benefit from this product. But, I was amazed by how it was developed and in production within a short period of time. Although this product is registered for trademark. The core organizers offer designs for free download and encourage more people to wear masks.
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I did some digging on the mass production for face masks. Here are the challenges and possible solutions:
- Although mold forming is patterned internationally, this can be done via traditional injection mold method (ie toy manufacturing process) by slightly change the design to avoid under cut and add draft angles. It will cost around AUD15K to make a metal mold.
- In order to meet health regulations, a clean room which is approved by Therapeutic Goods Administration, Australia (TGA) for production
- Any local demand? We need to educate others about #masks4all.
Letâs say Iâm willing to do a little bit more work than the tshirt and paper towel mask. Is there an obvious âupgradeâ pick? Something thatâs almost certainly a bit better but still fairly easy?
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The tide is turning. Keep up the good work, spread the good words.
CDC guidance on masks remains under development, the federal official said. The official said the new guidance would make clear that the general public should not use medical masks â including surgical and N95 masks â that are in desperately short supply and needed by health-care workers.
Instead, the recommendation under consideration calls for using do-it-yourself cloth coverings, according to a second official who shared that thinking on a personal Facebook account. It would be a way to help âflatten the curve,â the official noted.
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A great initiative in US to protect health care workers. Call for masks/PPE donors. Thank you @amritv for info.
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I shared this morning Jeremyâs article in the Washington Post on a call with CVS pharmacists emphazing the importance of #Masks4all. Healthcare professionals should be advising and counseling their patients on using masks.
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Whatâs wrong with W.H.O?
All of us around the world are blaming our governments, but WHO has been putting out confusing statements since the very start of this pandemic.
Who holds W.H.O accountable?
Please delete this post if inappropriate, but itâs infuriating.
Hey everyone,
I wanted to share our free patterns for homemade cloth face-masks. The first one sits closely on the face and is great for the general public, the other masks have a looser fit and can be work alone or over N95 respirators. We are working on more designs and will add few more models over the next week.
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Fitted mask with filter pocket
https://hellosewing.com/face-mask-sewing-pattern/ -
Surgical mask with elastic ear loops
https://hellosewing.com/how-to-sew-a-surgical-face-mask/ -
Cloth face mask with fabric ties, filter pocket and flexible nose
https://hellosewing.com/diy-cloth-face-mask-pleated-adjustable-ties
4. Nose wire piece materials - You can improve your face mask seal by adding bendable nose wire to your fabric face mask. You can fit a small metal strip/wire at the top â so that the metal can be molded over the nose and fit individual face shape better
https://hellosewing.com/flexible-nose-piece-materials/
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DIY Plastic face shield in 15 minutes
https://hellosewing.com/homemade-plastic-face-shield/
Hope you find these helpful.
If you like our masks and tutorials, please spread the word.
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On DIY âMask Filterâ with HEPA Fabric:
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After watching the make-your-own video a friend said, âMy old job was to teach about N95 (protecting you) and surgical masks (protecting others) but I never thought if we all wear masks we can all protect each other. Makes sense. I wish Canada would take note.â
Here in Madrid, which is very badly affected - despite the official advice still being that you only need to wear a mask if you have symptoms or are closer than 1m to somebody who is infected/suspected of being infected - when you go grocery shopping nearly everybody is wearing a mask. Knowing people who have died has this effect.
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Iâm also in Taiwan. Cancer (detection at population-scale and phylogenetics of metastasizing clades) is my field of research, not infectious pathogens.
This is true, and Iâve found it confounding. There is a clear discrepancy between this policy from the CDC and the actions of the government as a whole. The NHS put in place a nationwide distribution system for every man, woman, and child to receive a supply of new masks twice per week, to replace the ones being worn every day/week.
Anecdotally, at the daily CECC updates the entire staff and leadership are wearing masks, as are nearly all the people in the audience.
I believe that this stated TW CDC policy that youâre quoting is the impediment on government to government advice/guidance that masks make the difference. My policy friends at the American embassy (AIT) have told me this makes it hard to communicate a clear message up through the State Dept.
This is potentially misleading. Exporting masks was made illegal early, and only began to be discussed after the nationwide distribution to all residents and containment of local transmission* had been in effect for 8 weeks.
The * is for the likely difference between tested vs untested populations. The TW CDC is not doing randomized testing of the general population to determine the prevalence of asymptomatic cases. This is clearly a problem from a scientific perspective, and itâs difficult to understand what the rationale is for not doing population sampling.
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Respiratory virus shedding in exhaled breath and efficacy of face masks published by Nature Medicine on 3 April 2020
Abstract of the paper:
We identified seasonal human coronaviruses, influenza viruses and rhinoviruses in exhaled breath and coughs of children and adults with acute respiratory illness. Surgical face masks significantly reduced detection of influenza virus RNA in respiratory droplets and coronavirus RNA in aerosols, with a trend toward reduced detection of coronavirus RNA in respiratory droplets. Our results indicate that surgical face masks could prevent transmission of human coronaviruses and influenza viruses from symptomatic individuals.
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Hi Jason, itâs good to hear from another Taiwan resident. Are you new to Fast AI? I noticed this is your first post here.
There is a clear discrepancy between this policy from the CDC and the actions of the government as a whole. The NHS put in place a nationwide distribution system for every man, woman, and child to receive a supply of new masks twice per week, to replace the ones being worn every day/week.
Rationing masks was a response to demand, and I suspect a way to give some concerned people what they wanted while keeping stock available for medical workers. So I see rationing and guidance on âmasks being unnecessary for healthy peopleâ as congruent policy. At first, all the masks were being bought up by a small number of people.
Anecdotally, at the daily CECC updates the entire staff and leadership are wearing masks, as are nearly all the people in the audience.
Hmm looking at their most recent video that does not seem to be the case.
I believe that this stated TW CDC policy that youâre quoting is the impediment on government to government advice/guidance that masks make the difference. My policy friends at the American embassy (AIT) have told me this makes it hard to communicate a clear message up through the State Dept.
Iâm not sure I follow. Taiwan has been doing several things to contain the spread.
The TW CDC is not doing randomized testing of the general population to determine the prevalence of asymptomatic cases. This is clearly a problem from a scientific perspective, and itâs difficult to understand what the rationale is for not doing population sampling.
Hospitals are not overrun with unexplained cases of pneumonia, and at this stage that is a strong signal things are still under control. I feel lucky to be here and am grateful for the hard work everyone puts in to keep Taiwan healthy.
I would like to restate my original reason for replying in this topic. Iâve seen some hand-waving in reviews of Taiwanâs handling of COVID19, arguing that the mask-wearing culture protected it. This discounts other things the government did, such as sending a team to Wuhan in early January, stopping flights, tracking travelers required to self-isolate by phone/gps, and providing daily updates since January 22nd. They had a pandemic plan ready, acted early, and up to now have been diligent in following through.
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Hey Rob, Iâm new here, found the forum courtesy of Jeremy.
Youâre right about the CECC update yesterday, only the people behind the front row of speakers were masked. Today theyâre all masked ÂŻ_(ă)_/ÂŻ
Iâm grateful to be here as well.
I note your contention. And I dispute the hypothesis that discussion of the efficacy of population-scale mask-wearing is hand-waving, or more formally, a second-order influence on containment of local transmission.
There are 40k+ people quarantined here. Contact tracing is an effective response, and a high degree of successful tracing is without doubt a first-order influence. The likelihood that all asymptomatic vectors (infected people) have been identified and quarantined is ~0%. There are at least 3 pockets of local transmission that havenât been phylogenetically linked directly to known locally confirmed cases, the MRCA of these pockets is 2+ degrees from the nearest known local case.
So, local transmission is occurring under the radar of testing and outside of the safety net of contact tracing. Whatâs holding back the geometric growth of this background transmission, when everyone is out and about? Masks.
Hi, that is interesting that today the CECC is all wearing masks. In all prior videos they were not. I gather this is a signal that, as you said, due to untraceable cases and asymptomatic spread, itâs better to assume everyone has it.
Iâm saying Taiwanâs successes have not come from advising healthy people to wear masks because up to this point they have not given that guidance. Does some of their success come from having a culture of sick people wearing masks? Yes, absolutely!
I never said discussion of mask-wearing efficacy is hand-waving, I actually think that is productive. Rather, I said pointing to mask-wearing as the sole or main factor in Taiwan may be misleading. Specifically, it was this point in Jeremyâs video that made me want to share the other things Taiwan is doing that have been effective.
There are 40k+ people quarantined here.
Do you mean there have been 40k quarantines since the start? I see the majority of possible cases have had covid-19 ruled out. My understanding is 40k is a cumulative number and that most of those no longer need to self-isolate.
So, local transmission is occurring under the radar of testing and outside of the safety net of contact tracing. Whatâs holding back the geometric growth of this background transmission, when everyone is out and about? Masks.
Mask-wearing on sick individuals is definitely more prevalent here than it is in the West. So from my perspective that has been a factor. And, in some areas such as NYC, you might as well assume everyone is an asymptomatic carrier and advise everyone to wear one. As they say, my mask protects you, your mask protects me. I do wear one myself in order to protect others when I am unable to maintain proper distancing.
Thank you for the discussion. Iâm going to take a break from it for now. It is important that we learn the right lessons from this pandemic, and discussions like this are part of that.
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Outside of me figuring out to block time out for @jeremy to brief some additional Congressional members to get the Administration to take a more serious stance on #masks4all, I made a new Facebook Frame, looks like this on my profile:
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This is a good use of old t-shirts around the house too. I have 0 experience sewing, but I gave it a shot anyway and it works perfectly. Can likely be mixed and match with other links here too. E.g. adding a pocket for something to help tighten the gap between nose and face if you have a taller nose or sewing in a pocket for an additional filter.
Fabric ties are readily available but somewhat time consuming to sew, and elastic bands are hard to get our hands on. Then I sew this video. All you need to do is cut up your old T-shirt into 1 inch strip and PULL. Thatâs it! I tried it and it curls up like magic and youâve got yourself a stretchy fabric tie without sewing 
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