{"id":210615,"date":"2020-07-19T08:05:23","date_gmt":"2020-07-19T08:05:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=210615"},"modified":"2020-07-20T13:07:51","modified_gmt":"2020-07-20T13:07:51","slug":"flashback-coronavirus-face-masks-could-increase-risk-of-infection-medical-chief-warns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=210615","title":{"rendered":"Flashback &#8211; Coronavirus: Face masks could increase risk of infection, medical chief warns"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Chris Baynes \u2013 The Independent March 12, 2020<\/strong><\/h1>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/4sWjT70-es4\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n&#8212;<\/div>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">Members of the public could be putting themselves more at risk from contracting <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #ccffff; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/coronavirus\" data-vars-item-name=\"BL-9396811-\/topic\/coronavirus\" data-vars-event-id=\"c6\">coronavirus<\/a><\/strong><\/span> by wearing <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #ccffff; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/face-masks\" data-vars-item-name=\"BL-9396811-\/topic\/face-masks\" data-vars-event-id=\"c6\">face masks<\/a><\/strong><\/span>, one of England\u2019s most senior doctors has warned.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">Jenny Harries, deputy chief medical officer, said the masks could \u201cactually trap the virus\u201d and cause the person wearing it to breathe it in.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">\u201cFor the average member of the public walking down a street, it is not a good idea\u201d to wear a face mask in the hope of preventing infection, she added.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">Sales of the masks have sky-rocketed since the Covid-19 outbreak began, with retailers including Boots and Amazon <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #ccffff; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/news\/uk\/home-news\/coronavirus-china-face-masks-boots-amazon-stock-flu-hygiene-a9309771.html\" data-vars-item-name=\"BL-9396811-https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/news\/uk\/home-news\/coronavirus-china-face-masks-boots-amazon-stock-flu-hygiene-a9309771.html\" data-vars-event-id=\"c6\">selling out of the products<\/a><\/strong><\/span> before the virus had even taken hold in the UK.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">Asked about their effectiveness, Dr Harries told BBC News: \u201cWhat tends to happen is people will have one mask. They won\u2019t wear it all the time, they will take it off when they get home, they will put it down on a surface they haven\u2019t cleaned.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">\u201cOr they will be out and they haven\u2019t washed their hands, they will have a cup of coffee somewhere, they half hook it off, they wipe something over it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">\u201cIn fact, you can actually trap the virus in the mask and start breathing it in.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">Asked if people are putting themselves more at risk by wearing masks, Dr Harries added: \u201cBecause of these behavioural issues, people can adversely put themselves at more risk than less.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">However, she said those who are advised to wear one by healthcare workers should follow their guidance.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">Demand for face masks in China, where the coronavirus outbreak began, exceeded 200 million a day in January, prompting manufacturers to cancel staff leave and increase wages to ramp up production.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">But Jake Dunning, head of emerging infections and zoonoses [infectious disease spread between humans and animals] at Public Health England, <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #ccffff; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/life-style\/coronavirus-do-face-masks-work-stop-virus-spread-symptoms-usa-outbreak-china-a9359336.html\" data-vars-item-name=\"BL-9396811-https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/life-style\/coronavirus-do-face-masks-work-stop-virus-spread-symptoms-usa-outbreak-china-a9359336.html\" data-vars-event-id=\"c6\">told <\/a><em><a style=\"color: #ccffff; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/life-style\/coronavirus-do-face-masks-work-stop-virus-spread-symptoms-usa-outbreak-china-a9359336.html\" data-vars-item-name=\"BL-9396811-https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/life-style\/coronavirus-do-face-masks-work-stop-virus-spread-symptoms-usa-outbreak-china-a9359336.html\" data-vars-event-id=\"c6\">The Independent<\/a> <\/em><\/strong><\/span>there was \u201cvery little evidence of a widespread benefit\u201d from wearing them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ccffff;\">\u201cFace masks must be worn correctly, changed frequently, removed properly, disposed of safely and used in combination with good universal hygiene behaviour in order for them to be effective,\u201d he added.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/news\/health\/coronavirus-news-face-masks-increase-risk-infection-doctor-jenny-harries-a9396811.html\">Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Six months ago Britain\u2019s deputy chief medical officer warned that face-masks could be counter-productive against coronavirus <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[61,105],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-210615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-Commentary","category-coronavirus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=210615"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210615\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":210668,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210615\/revisions\/210668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=210615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=210615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=210615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}