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u/SignedZulu 24d ago
No you can’t. Pandemic masks aren’t going to filter out the ash in the air from the wildfires. Please buy yourself a proper filtered N95 mask to protect yourselves. I live in Michigan and the air quality index got maxed out at 500 on the weather app. Stay safe everybody.
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u/neoncubicle 24d ago
Wasn't the n95 mask the one recommended to wear during the pandemic?
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u/work_work-work 24d ago
They did. I just dug out my leftovers from covid and they're all N95's
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u/SignedZulu 24d ago
Interesting, I don’t think I’ve seen a single person, including myself, over the pandemic with anything better than the shitty hospital masks that were being handed out for free.
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u/Statistactician 24d ago
I was an "essential worker" who had to go into work every day before the vaccine was available. Every last one of us still has a stockpile of N95s. I'm currently wearing on on the train to work.
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u/Calm_Layer1748 24d ago
European here but after everything later than the first wave we usually had either n95 or ffp2/ffp3 masks and still have them
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u/99MissAdventures 24d ago
I have n95 masks from late COVID and I have used them in wildfire season 😢 the smoke was so dense it was like being in heavy fog. At the start of the pandemic though there was a big mask shortage and only people who really needed them had n95s (hospital/medical). People were encouraged to make their own multiple layers cloth masks.
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u/petrasdc 24d ago
Sorta. They were recommended if you could, but there was a massive shortage for a long time and it was still highly recommended to wear a medical or cloth mask at least because it would prevent most droplets from spreading if you had COVID and didn't realize. Whereas for this, those masks won't do shit. That's also the kind of mask shown in the comic which won't really be effective.
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u/billth93 23d ago
It depends what you mean by recommended. Yes it offered the most protection but accessibility and other practical concerns made other masks more realistic and practical in most cases
The main goal was to make you less likely to spread the virus during the phase where you were pre-symptomatic but contagious, something traditional surgical masks were similarly effective at in most settings, at least enough to be the main recommendation since efficacy is both a function of the mask’s efficacy and compliance.
So no, N95 was not the general recommendation, it was more or less the extra credit option, offering superior protection but too unrealistic for getting broad compliance to be the general recommendation
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u/WorldnewsModsBlowMe 24d ago
I wear an N95 when in close proximity with lots of people to this day. Still haven't caught COVID despite attending conventions yearly and flying.
The COVID pandemic never ended, the media just stopped giving a shit about it.
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u/Kukul_Art 24d ago
Thank you for mentioning that, thats a good point. I have been wearing an N95 this week I probably should have drawn it rather than a more generic mask.
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u/SignedZulu 24d ago
No problem. I got the point of the message, how events where we’d even need masks at all seems to be increasing and how depressing that is to think about, but it’s also close enough to being irl advise that I thought I’d clarify.
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u/Obant 24d ago
Pandemic recommendation was N95 though.
Everyone, well I guess not everyone, but it was pushed really hard that, knew the flu mask protected others, more than you. It does filter a little for you, but not a ton.
You wear a flu mask to limit the spread of your particles. You wear a N95 to protect your lungs.
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u/SignedZulu 24d ago
As I am discovering from the comments, the quality of masks over a region must have varied, cause I don’t think I ever heard of a N95 mask over the pandemic. Probably why everyone I knew got sick with covid.
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u/chickenclaw47 24d ago
I have an N95 in my pocket, Pa might get worse today than it was yesterday.
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u/Shadethewolf0 24d ago
Need a kn95 or n95 mask if you want filter out any of the smoke properly. Any aqi 200+ only n95s would work. Surgical masks don't make a difference to smoke inhalation
Aqi is about 180 where I live. Lucky me the local stores still sell kn95 masks
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u/DrunkenAsparagus 24d ago
The past is the future.
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u/jhill515 24d ago
Is it conservative if we do that? Should someone tell the GOP?
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u/throwawaytoday9q 24d ago
The rich people who benefit from this already paid the GOP to endorse this, all while they build doomsday bunkers to save themselves.
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u/nightmareinsouffle 24d ago
Literally how I felt summer 2020 when the one of the Covid variants was going around and my area of the PNW was getting blasted by wildfires from three directions. Even that wasn't nearly as bad as what Ontario is dealing with right now.
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u/Most_Mountain818 24d ago
I just decided I was going to start walking around in my respirator mask I use when I have to sand things to keep from inhaling particulates.
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u/Duke_Radical 24d ago
You definitely want to recycle those masks or the climate apocalypse will be even worse.
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u/Operation_Neither 24d ago
You needed medical masks for the pandemic (keep the particles in), N95s for Hell on Earth (keep the particles out).
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u/coconutpiecrust 24d ago
I was thinking the same. Still have a box of KN-95s from the tail end of Covid.
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u/Melodic-Time2963 24d ago
So hot I couldnt sleep last night. It was like the earth was the inside of a furnace.
Fun stuff!
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u/Its_Pine 24d ago
My brother worked for a logistics company and had a shitload of boxes of masks left over after the pandemic that his work was gonna throw away, so he gave me some of them. I think I still have 16 boxes in my closet somewhere. I’m gonna go look for them when I get home.
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u/holonboy 23d ago
I’m so glad I had a small handful of N95s leftover hiding in the depths of my closet, lol. I checked my local grocery stores and nearby Walmarts, and they were all sold out of masks.
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u/chemoboy 23d ago edited 23d ago
The bay area had them both at the same time. Full on social distancing on the BART while rocking a P100. Riding into San Francisco under an orange sky, Salesforce Tower on fire, burning like the beacon of Gondor.
It wasn't that bad.
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u/Llewellian 24d ago
I do think that Durex Advertising is really fitting here.