Respiratory Virus Shedding in Exhaled Breath and Efficacy of Face Masks
By Nancy H. L. Leung, D. Chu, E. Shiu, Kwok-Hung Chan, James J. Mcdevitt, Benien J. P. Hau, H. Yen, Yuguo Li, D. Ip, J. Peiris and 4 more. Nature Medicine, 2020
2,167 citations recorded by the source corpus.
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. A study of 246 individuals with seasonal respiratory virus infections randomized to wear or not wear a surgical face mask showed that masks can significantly reduce detection of coronavirus and influenza virus in exhaled breath and may help interrupt virus transmission.
Subfields: Epidemiology, Pulmonary and Respiratory Medicine
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/ac70c9f17e0ed136d5a164b67e9542176f5e9c29
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In Epidemiology
Citations in the corpus
- Airborne transmission of SARS-CoV-2: The world should face the reality (2020, background): “…(PPE), in particular masks and respirators should be recommended, to be used in public places where density of people is high and ventilation potentially inadequate, as they can protect against infection others (by infected individuals) and being infected (Huang et al. 2019; Leung et al. 2020).”
- Gender differences in COVID-19 attitudes and behavior: Panel evidence from eight countries (2020, background): “These rules have been shown to reduce both the individual risk of infection and the likelihood of contaminating others (2, 3).”
- Airborne transmission of respiratory viruses (2021, background): “Surgical masks have been shown to reduce the release of influenza virus, seasonal human coronaviruses, and rhinovirus in aerosols <5 mm into the air by infected individuals by up to 100% (104, 178), although for some individuals there was no reduction; andmasks are more effective for limiting drople”
- Face Masks in the New COVID-19 Normal: Materials, Testing, and Perspectives (2020, background): “Viruses released when an infected person coughs, sneezes, sings, talks, or merely exhales may be found in particles of varying sizes [17].”
- COVID-19 and Public Transportation: Current Assessment, Prospects, and Research Needs (2020, background): “Although there is still plenty of uncertainty about the various ways in which COVID-19 contagion occurs (Leung et al. 2020; Han et al. 2020), airborne transmission in closed environments has been established by several authors (Morawska and Cao 2020; Shen et al. 2020; Prather, Wang, and Schooley…”
- Face masks for the public during the covid-19 crisis (2020, background): “Another argument for using the precautionary principle is that the world may pay a high price for covid-19 and the “collateral damage” risks becoming higher than the direct damage from the virus.”