Invited Editorial: Effectiveness of Surgical and Cotton Masks in Blocking COVID-19 Spread

Abstract

The use of cloth mask or cotton mask by health care works or the general public in infection prevention has been cautions in a large sampled cluster randomized trial of cloth masks compared with medical masks. The study concluded that medical or surgical mask was potent in preventing infection in the hospital setting. A new study however detected greater contamination of COVID-19 on the outer surfaces both surgical mask and cotton or cloth mask than the inner mask surfaces. This study goes contrary to the early studies on the use of surgical mask for infection prevention. This currently study is misleading and distorting the literature on the use of surgical mask in infection prevention. In the current COVID-19 outbreak, it is most anticipate that hospital as well as community prevention of the spread of the disease involves the use of medical mask and not cloth mask.