Ukrainian scientist explains why you need to wear a mask on the street
Semen Yesylevskyi, a senior researcher at the Department of Physics of Biological Systems in the Institute of Physics of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, considers the requirement to wear masks on the streets to be justified.
He wrote about this on Facebook.
"The fact is that the British strain is much more contagious than last year's 'wild' strain. It's much easier to transmit, and even fleeting contact with the carrier is now much more dangerous than before," Yesylevskyi said.
He noted it was impossible to comply with the distance requirements on a busy street.
"In a couple of minutes, a dozen people will breathe at you from a fairly close distance. Yes, the contacts are fleeting, a couple of seconds, but there are many of them. With such a background incidence as we have now, the probability of being a 'breathed-at' carrier is very significant," he said.
The scientist also draws attention to "buffer zones" at the entrances to the premises. If masks are mandatory indoors and not required outside, people stop at the door to remove or put on the mask. In such clusters, the risk of infection increases.
As examples, the scientist cites the "foyers" of shops, subway lobbies, porches.
"Third, it's much easier to develop a habit of putting a mask before leaving the apartment and taking it off on arrival home than to remember that you need to pull it in advance before any crowd inside or outside the room. The person's attention is very limited, and it's unnecessary to test it," Yesylevskyi stressed.
At the same time, he believes that a mask isn't needed when walking alone in the park.
"But the keyword here is solitude. Kyiv parks at the weekend don't differ in density of the flow of people from the busy street," Yesylevskyi wrote.
According to him, the requirement to wear masks everywhere in the city outside the private apartment is quite justified.
As Rubryka reported, the Cabinet of Ministers forbade being without masks or respirators in public places in the regions classified as "red" epidemic danger zone.
The Ministry of Internal Affairs stated the police would fine citizens for not wearing a mask in public places only after them ignoring the warning.
It's also known that the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has made changes to the resolution on restrictions that should be observed in the "red" zone. In particular, the government clarified exactly where to wear masks.
