<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Guy Betsy:
Actually it has been reported in the press in Singapore that a surgical mask is not going to help much.</font>
My reading is that many of those working in hospitals weren't using their masks. A standard plastic surgical mask will keep out large droplets, and that is really all that's needed. So far as we know, this is spread like the cold, and that means fairly large droplets.
This is not gas, okay. It's just prevention from catching the flu.
Even if it's not 100%, reducing the number of inhaled droplets will improve your chance of not catching whatever it is. It's not like one single virus strand will infect you with a given disease.
[This message has been edited by Plato90s (edited 03-16-2003).]