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Surgical Masks Help Block Germs But Are No Guarantee

A woman wearing a face mask looks at her phone in Chinatown in the Manhattan borough of New York City, Jan. 25, 2020.
A woman wearing a face mask looks at her phone in Chinatown in the Manhattan borough of New York City, Jan. 25, 2020.

Imagine you're riding public transport to school or work and the man across the aisle erupts in a sneeze that explodes into the air. Halfway down the car, someone else coughs uncontrollably. Neither cover their mouth or nose.

The woman next to you is wearing a surgical mask, but you are not.

Are you doomed to get sick?

Experts say yes. And no.

Viruses -- like the coronavirus outbreak that started in Wuhan, China, recently and has migrated around the globe -- typically ride on aerosolized droplets, meaning the stuff that comes out of your nose and mouth when you cough and sneeze, explained Dr. Donald Milton, who directs the Maryland Institute for Applied Environmental Health.

Milton studies airborne viruses and heads the University of Maryland response team to students returning to school from China and other international travel. While surgical masks are advised -- particularly the N95 particulate respirator mask -- they do not offer complete coverage.

The U.S. government warns that masks do not "filter or block very small particles in the air that may be transmitted by coughs, sneezes or certain medical procedures."

And masks can’t prevent droplets from getting into your eyes, Milton said.

"I like to describe [it] as getting hit with a ballistic droplet in the eye,” he said.

Social media has been sharing hashtag #coveryourmouth, admonishing people to use the crook of their arm, a handkerchief or a tissue to block the spew of aerosolized germs in public places.

And then there are the railings, seats, doors and myriad handles that people routinely touch moving in and out of subways, classrooms, shops and at home after also touching their faces, noses and mouths.

"Door knobs are a favorite suspect,” Milton said. So handwashing (include the wrists and lower arms, health officials say) and disinfecting are key.

A passenger wearing a mask boards a flight after cases of the coronavirus have been confirmed in the U.S., in Boston, Massachusetts, Jan. 24, 2020.
A passenger wearing a mask boards a flight after cases of the coronavirus have been confirmed in the U.S., in Boston, Massachusetts, Jan. 24, 2020.

Millennial Doktora (@MillennialMD) tweeted a public service announcement Jan. 21, around the time the coronavirus outbreak began to make news.

"1. Wash your hands frequently. Use rubbing alcohol if this is not possible. 2. Cover your mouth when sneezing or coughing and then wash your hands. 3. Use face mask if you have cough. 4. Stay away from the young, elderly, pregnant, & cancer patients if you have [upper respiratory tract infection] symptoms,” she tweeted. “5. Don’t kiss babies!!! Not even their hands and feet. And wash your hands before and after touching a baby. 6. Teach young kids coughing and sneezing etiquette and handwashing technique especially when they go to school. 7. Drink your water, eat your fruits and veggies."

While surgical masks are not so unusual in Asian countries, they are conspicuous in Western ones where people might be reticent to use them, reported Japan Today in a story about surgical masks in 2017. “

In the UK, nobody would wear a mask like this unless they were very, very sick, or there was otherwise something terribly wrong afoot,” Japan Today reported. The article also cited an incident where locals in a seaside English town thought Japanese tourists wearing masks might be terrorists.

Frequent traveler Francesca Domenella said, at her father's urging, she started wearing a surgical mask after returning from China Jan. 12. The Italian aerospace engineer, working as a risk engineer for a global commercial insurance company, found a mask in a stylish black that is washable.

In Europe, surgical masks are not common so I was expecting people to give me weird looks, which they do as soon as they realize I am not Asian,” Domenella, who was traveling through Germany on her way to London, told VOA in an email. “People sneeze, cough all the time and it’s better to have it. I am wearing it now too. … Makes me feel like wearing an accessory rather than a device.”

The populations most at risk of contracting the virus are the elderly, the very young and those with compromised immune systems.

Milton said the college-age population of healthy young adults is less likely to get sick.

Early screening and identification, isolation and treatment are key to controlling the spread of the virus, he said. Among the more than 1 million international students in the U.S., more than 300,000 are Chinese. The U.S. universities with the largest Chinese-student populations are in New York, California, Massachusetts, Illinois and Indiana.

"We can handle this. It depends on early detection,” he said from the University of Maryland, which enrolls about 2,000 Chinese students.

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What types of graduate student housing are there?

FILE - The UCLA campus on April 25, 2019.
FILE - The UCLA campus on April 25, 2019.

Anayat Durrani of the US News & World Report breaks down the options. (April 2024)

Pro-Palestinian protests spread on US university campuses

Pro-Palestinian protests spread on US university campuses
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U.S. university campuses are seeing pro-Palestinian protests daily. Students are demonstrating against the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and demanding that humanitarian aid be allowed to flow into the territory. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias reports.

US police clash with students who demand colleges cut financial ties to Israel

A University of Southern California protester, right, confronts a University Public Safety officer at the campus' Alumni Park during a pro-Palestinian occupation in Los Angeles, California, April 24, 2024.
A University of Southern California protester, right, confronts a University Public Safety officer at the campus' Alumni Park during a pro-Palestinian occupation in Los Angeles, California, April 24, 2024.

Police tangled with student demonstrators in the U.S. states of Texas and California while new encampments sprouted Wednesday at Harvard and other colleges as school leaders sought ways to defuse a growing wave of pro-Palestinian protests.

At the University of Texas at Austin, hundreds of local and state police — including some on horseback and holding batons — clashed with protesters, pushing them off the campus lawn and at one point sending some tumbling into the street. At least 20 demonstrators were taken into custody at the request of university officials and Texas Governor Greg Abbott, according to the state Department of Public Safety.

A photographer covering the demonstration for Fox 7 Austin was arrested after being caught in a push-and-pull between law enforcement and students, the station confirmed. A longtime Texas journalist was knocked down in the mayhem and could be seen bleeding before police helped him to emergency medical staff who bandaged his head.

At the University of Southern California, police got into a back-and-forth tugging match with protesters over tents, removing several before falling back. At the northern end of California, students were barricaded inside a building for a third day at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt. The school shut down campus through the weekend and made classes virtual.

Harvard University in Massachusetts had sought to stay ahead of protests this week by limiting access to Harvard Yard and requiring permission for tents and tables. That didn't stop protesters from setting up a camp with 14 tents Wednesday following a rally against the university's suspension of the Harvard Undergraduate Palestine Solidarity Committee.

Students protesting the Israel-Hamas war are demanding schools cut financial ties to Israel and divest from companies enabling its monthslong conflict. Dozens have been arrested on charges of trespassing or disorderly conduct. Some Jewish students say the protests have veered into antisemitism and made them afraid to set foot on campus.

A University of Southern California protester is detained by USC Department of Public Safety officers during a pro-Palestinian occupation at the campus' Alumni Park in Los Angeles, California, April 24, 2024.
A University of Southern California protester is detained by USC Department of Public Safety officers during a pro-Palestinian occupation at the campus' Alumni Park in Los Angeles, California, April 24, 2024.

Columbia University averted another confrontation between students and police earlier in the day. The situation there remained tense, with campus officials saying it would continue talks with protesters for another 48 hours.

On a visit to campus, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, called on Columbia University President Minouche Shafik to resign "if she cannot bring order to this chaos."

"If this is not contained quickly and if these threats and intimidation are not stopped, there is an appropriate time for the National Guard," he said.

Shafik had set a midnight Tuesday deadline to reach an agreement on clearing an encampment, but the school extended negotiations, saying it was making "important progress."

On Wednesday evening, a Columbia spokesperson said rumors that the university had threatened to bring in the National Guard were unfounded. "Our focus is to restore order, and if we can get there through dialogue, we will," said Ben Chang, Columbia's vice president for communications.

Columbia graduate student Omer Lubaton Granot, who put up pictures of Israeli hostages near the encampment, said he wanted to remind people that there were more than 100 hostages still being held by Hamas.

A person prays in front of photos of hostages taken captive from Israel on October 7. The fliers are near an encampment at Columbia University in New York, one of many U.S. campuses where students are protesting to show support for Palestinians, April 24, 2024.
A person prays in front of photos of hostages taken captive from Israel on October 7. The fliers are near an encampment at Columbia University in New York, one of many U.S. campuses where students are protesting to show support for Palestinians, April 24, 2024.

"I see all the people behind me advocating for human rights," he said. "I don't think they have one word to say about the fact that people their age, that were kidnapped from their homes or from a music festival in Israel, are held by a terror organization."

Harvard law student Tala Alfoqaha, who is Palestinian, said she and other protesters want more transparency from the university.

"My hope is that the Harvard administration listens to what its students have been asking for all year, which is divestment, disclosure and dropping any sort of charges against students," she said.

Pro-Palestinian protests spread on US university campuses
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Columbia encampment inspires others

Police first tried to clear the encampment at Columbia last week, when they arrested more than 100 protesters. The move backfired, acting as an inspiration for other students across the country to set up similar encampments and motivating protesters at Columbia to regroup.

On Wednesday about 60 tents remained at the Columbia encampment, which appeared calm. Security remained tight around campus, with identification required and police setting up metal barricades.

Columbia said it had agreed with protest representatives that only students would remain at the encampment and they would make it welcoming, banning discriminatory or harassing language.

On the University of Minnesota campus, a few dozen students rallied a day after nine protesters were arrested when police took down an encampment in front of the library. U.S. Representative Ilhan Omar, whose daughter was among the demonstrators arrested at Columbia last week, attended a protest later in the day.

A group of more than 80 professors and assistant professors signed a letter Wednesday calling on the university's president and other administrators to drop any charges and to allow future encampments without what they described as police retaliation.

They wrote that they were "horrified that the administration would permit such a clear violation of our students' rights to freely speak out against genocide and ongoing occupation of Palestine."

Netanyahu encourages police response

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lashed out at the pro-Palestinian demonstrations on U.S. college campuses in a video statement released Wednesday, saying the response of several university presidents has been "shameful" and calling on state, local and federal officials to intervene.

Students at some protests were hiding their identities and declined to identify themselves to reporters, saying they feared retribution. At an encampment of about 40 tents at the heart of the University of Michigan's campus in Ann Arbor, almost every student wore a mask, which was handed to them when they entered.

The upwelling of demonstrations has left universities struggling to balance campus safety with free speech rights. Many long tolerated the protests, but are now doling out more heavy-handed discipline, citing safety concerns.

At New York University this week, police said 133 protesters were taken into custody and all had been released with summonses to appear in court on disorderly conduct charges. More than 40 protesters were arrested Monday at an encampment at Yale University.

Columbia University demonstrators in talks with administration officials

Demonstration leader Khymani James, center right, and other protesters address the media outside a tent camp on the campus of Columbia University in New York on April 24, 2024.
Demonstration leader Khymani James, center right, and other protesters address the media outside a tent camp on the campus of Columbia University in New York on April 24, 2024.

Officials at Columbia University were continuing talks Wednesday with student demonstrators from the Gaza Solidarity Encampment as the protest reaches a full week.

At 9:41 p.m. Tuesday, university President Nemat “Minouche” Shafik sent an email to the Columbia community setting a midnight deadline for an agreement to be reached about dismantling the encampment and dispersing the protesters.

“I very much hope these discussions are successful,” she wrote. “If they are not, we will have to consider alternative options for clearing the West Lawn and restoring calm to campus so that students can complete the term and graduate.”

Pro-Palestinian protests spread on US university campuses
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As midnight passed, Columbia University Apartheid Divest posted a statement on X saying, “We refuse to concede to cowardly threats and blatant intimidation by university administration. We will continue to peacefully protest.”

The statement also said the university had threatened to call the National Guard. But after visiting the university earlier in the week, New York Governor Kathy Hochul said Tuesday she had no plans to deploy the National Guard.

As midnight approached on Tuesday, a student organizer announced that the deadline had been extended to 8 a.m. Wednesday.

At 4:09 a.m., the Office of the President sent an email saying the discussion deadline would be extended for 48 hours, given the constructive dialogue, and the university would report back on progress.

The email announced that leaders of the student encampment had agreed to remove a significant number of tents, get non-Columbia affiliates to leave the encampment and comply with New York Fire Department requirements. They also agreed to ensure that the encampment is “welcome to all” and to prohibit “discriminatory or harassing language.”

This development comes nearly a week after more than 100 students were arrested at the school on April 18, after Shafik authorized police to clear away protesters. Some of the students received suspension notices from the school.

Columbia’s action prompted an onslaught of pro-Palestinian demonstrations at other universities and responses from faculty and politicians.

Students at other campuses, such as Yale, Stanford and New York University, have also rallied around the Palestinian cause, calling for their universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel and for a cease-fire in Gaza. Many also have put up tent encampments on their campuses. About 150 students and faculty were arrested at New York University Monday night.

Columbia also announced Tuesday morning that classes on the Morningside main campus, where the protests are taking place, will be offered in a hybrid format for the remainder of the spring semester. The last day of classes is April 29.

Paper: International students faced extra pandemic challenges

FILE - Jackson State University student Kendra Daye reacts as Tameiki Lee, a nurse with the Jackson-Hinds Comprehensive Health Center, injects her with the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, in Jackson, Miss., Sept. 21, 2021.
FILE - Jackson State University student Kendra Daye reacts as Tameiki Lee, a nurse with the Jackson-Hinds Comprehensive Health Center, injects her with the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, in Jackson, Miss., Sept. 21, 2021.

Astrobites, which describes itself as "a daily astrophysical literature journal written by graduate students in astronomy since 2010," focuses on the challenges international students faced during the COVID-19 pandemic.

It examines a paper published in the Journal of Comparative & International Higher Education entitled The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on International Students in a Public University in the United States: Academic and Non-academic Challenges.

Read the Astrobites article here. (April 2024)

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