Surgical masks are meant to protect patients from the wearer. They offer little protection for the wearer against things floating in the air, like viruses. From George Giles at lewrockwell.com:
As always government turns things upside down. I spent nine years working in Cardiac Surgery and I learned a thing or two about healthcare during this time. Here are my opinions along with a little science.
Surgeons. nurses and other operating room personnel in a surgical suite wear a mask. They wear these masks trying to mitigate the effects of the normal human body. During surgery the body cavity is open, exposing the sterile interior to the outside un-sterile world. This world is a biological soup of dirt, debris, chemicals, viruses and bacteria. Any of these landing in the sterile interior can potentially be very bad leading to infections, sepsis and death.
Human beings respire and with the warm breath can come any number of things of the aforementioned biological soup. Surgical suites cannot prevent airflow and the wind can bring lots of un-sterile things into the sterile field. I have never seen a gas tight surgical suite with an airlock so when the patient/staff enter/exit the air we breathe can drag a lot of other things along for the ride.
Surgical masks protect the patient from the surgical staff they were not designed to protect the wearer of the mask from the patient!
