Is this too simple????

[Sage]

I see constant articles and fancy ways to disinfect a face mask. A new way, usually expensive, every day.

Scientists say the bug lives so many days. Different for various surfaces. Paper and cloth, 3-5 days.

Is this just too simple???? Hang the dam mask in a clean area for 5 days. Bug is now dead. Use the mask again.

 

[Boatboy24]

If someone could actually state with certainty how long the bug lives, it'd be perfect. But nobody seems to know. With my research, I've narrowed it down to somewhere between 30 minutes and 17 days. I have a washable cloth one. It gets washed every so often, and I usually keep it on the dashboard of my car. I figure it's probably over 120 degrees there in the sun and I'm baking the bug to death in between washes.

 

[sour_grapes]

Many people do that, i.e., have a number of masks on rotation. I do this to a small extent. Seems reasonable to me.

I have been keeping a bucket of quats (quaternary ammonium compounds) on my kitchen counter for wiping down surfaces, etc. Often, I will dunk my mask in there, wring out, and hang out to dry.

 

[BernardSmith]

Make a cloth mask and wash it in boiling water after each use. That may mean that you need a week's supply of masks and not just one but that will depend on where you go and what you do.

 

[Sage]

I'm actually referring to the N95 not home cloth ones.

A fairly high percentage of those were wore less the 5 minutes. Go in, visit a patient, discard, put on a new one for the next patient. No wonder there was a shortage.

They should have been marked for the individual and recycled. Some obviously be should not have been recycled.

 

[Handy Andy]

Probably not good examples. I have seen people, dabbing alcohol based hand wash behind their ears and spraying it into the masks as they go into restaurants. as well as washing their hands with it

 

[BernardSmith]

But N95 are meant for health care workers treating patients. They are like sharps , are they not - designed to used once and tossed, no? and if used as intended they WILL almost certainly be covered in viral material in a way that cloth masks worn by you and me are unlikely to be contaminated (unlikely but could be).

 

[Sage]

I had a couple of boxes of N95 I used when woodworking. They are for fine particles. After years of cabinet building, the dust started getting to me more than a regular dust mask could handle. I noticed that the guys on a couple of woodworking tv shows use N95s. I gave the extra box to the local small hospital, still have a half dozen. I reuse several times until the straps finally give up.

 

[DizzyIzzy]

I see constant articles and fancy ways to disinfect a face mask. A new way, usually expensive, every day.

Scientists say the bug lives so many days. Different for various surfaces. Paper and cloth, 3-5 days.

Is this just too simple???? Hang the dam mask in a clean area for 5 days. Bug is now dead. Use the mask again.

I like to hang my mask in the sunshine for a couple of days. Sun is a great and old-fashioned sanitizer....................Dizzy

 

[BernardSmith]

I like to hang my mask in the sunshine for a couple of days. Sun is a great and old-fashioned sanitizer....................Dizzy

and we know that sunlight kills this virus? What? after a few hours? A few days? A few weeks? Months? Not the same thing, but prions (peculiarly folding proteins that are the basis of mad cow disease) cannot be destroyed by autoclave which is why the Red Cross in the USA will not accept blood donations from anyone who lived in Britain during the mad cow epidemic (me , for example and I was and am a vegetarian!) If prions get into hospital or transfusion equipment the equipment needs to be destroyed. So what makes you confident that Covid 19 is destroyed by sunlight? Not saying that it isn't but if your life depended on you being right what evidence do you have that is convincing?

 

[sour_grapes]

and we know that sunlight kills this virus? What? after a few hours? A few days? A few weeks? Months? Not the same thing, but prions (peculiarly folding proteins that are the basis of mad cow disease) cannot be destroyed by autoclave which is why the Red Cross in the USA will not accept blood donations from anyone who lived in Britain during the mad cow epidemic (me , for example and I was and am a vegetarian!) If prions get into hospital or transfusion equipment the equipment needs to be destroyed. So what makes you confident that Covid 19 is destroyed by sunlight? Not saying that it isn't but if your life depended on you being right what evidence do you have that is convincing?

Bernard, I don't claim to know the answers to all of your questions, but there is a fair amount of evidence that sunlight degrades this virus. Just for one that came near the top of the googler:

Simulated Sunlight Rapidly Inactivates SARS-CoV-2 on Surfaces
The Journal of Infectious Diseases, Volume 222, Issue 2, 15 July 2020, Pages 214–222, https://doi.org/10.1093/infdis/jiaa274

Abstract
Previous studies have demonstrated that SARS-CoV-2 is stable on surfaces for extended periods under indoor conditions. In the present study, simulated sunlight rapidly inactivated SARS-CoV-2 suspended in either simulated saliva or culture media and dried on stainless steel coupons. Ninety percent of infectious virus was inactivated every 6.8 minutes in simulated saliva and every 14.3 minutes in culture media when exposed to simulated sunlight representative of the summer solstice at 40°N latitude at sea level on a clear day. Significant inactivation also occurred, albeit at a slower rate, under lower simulated sunlight levels. The present study provides the first evidence that sunlight may rapidly inactivate SARS-CoV-2 on surfaces, suggesting that persistence, and subsequently exposure risk, may vary significantly between indoor and outdoor environments. Additionally, these data indicate that natural sunlight may be effective as a disinfectant for contaminated nonporous materials.

I'm not saying this is definitive, but it seems favorable enough to me that I personally put my mask outside in the sunshine.

 

[BernardSmith]

OK ... but I am reading only the abstract and not the body of the paper and not analyzing the data the authors bring but this sentence suggests that there are materials that may not perform in quite the same way as the stainless steel used in this experiment. And I quote: sunlight "may be effective as a disinfectant for contaminated nonporous materials". (emphasis added). That suggests to me that the authors are not discussing the effectiveness of sunlight as a disinfectant for cloth masks, for example or clothing. Just sayin'.

 

[sour_grapes]

And I quote: sunlight "may be effective as a disinfectant for contaminated nonporous materials". (emphasis added).

Yeah, good point.

Maybe false hope for me!