N95 Masks Offer The Best Protection From Coronavirus Transmission

According to an article published in The Lancet on September 11, 2020, 'the medical community has long acknowledged infection via speech-generated respiratory droplets, including droplet nuclei that might stay airborne for an extended time. And the importance of symptomless transmission of SARS-CoV-2 (ie, in the absence of coughing or sneezing), whether retrospectively identified as asymptomatic, presymptomatic, or even oligosymptomatic, has also been well established.'

'With high viral titers in the oral fluid of such carriers well documented, and a substantial proportion of speech droplets of oral fluid now shown to remain airborne for many minutes, inhalation of such particles represents a direct route to the nasopharynx... of the new coronavirus.'

While wearing a cloth face mask when in public spaces has become the recommended practice during the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers from India have now experimentally visualized the flow fields of coughs under various common mouth covering scenarios, such as elbows usage.

However, this study published on August 25, 2020, shows N95 masks have the best effectiveness and completely contain the horizontal virus spread when up close to an infectious person, to between 0.1 m and 0.25 m. But... "Adequate distancing is something that must not be ignored, since masks are not foolproof."