At the time of this update COVID-19 has killed over 5,300 Canadians, resulted in record unemployment and devastated the our economy. Businesses have closed and we have distanced ourselves from our friends and families. It is in all our interest to stop the spread of disease.

Models of COVID-19 transmission show that if a sufficient proportion of people wear effective masks that the infection will burn out. Countries which have enacted mask laws or have a culture where mask use is the norm, have generally outperformed their counterparts in suppressing transmission, and scientific studies have shown that masks act as a barrier to transmission.

In order to help stop spread of COVID-19 in Canada the general public should be expected to wear masks in public indoor, or enclosed spaces, and outdoors when social distancing can't be maintained.

As time is of the essence to achieve this change of behaviour we need government to act to ensure Canadians are mandated to wear masks outside of their homes. When there is sufficient supply the government should provide Canadians with medical masks, until then cloth masks should be used by the public. Government agencies should also work to determine which cloth mask designs are most effective in the interim and provide guidance to the public their use

Below I've attached a few references and links:

This site nicely summarizes why you should wear a mask in further detail:

https://masks4all.co

If you are more interested in a scientific articles here is a good review:

https://www.preprints.org/manuscript/202004.0203/v1

as is this one:

https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m1435

Wearing a mask significantly significantly reduced detectable virus in respiratory droplets:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0843-2

Modelling of mask usage in influenza shows that widespread adoption is important to control disease:

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/risa.13181



A group of scientists and economists from Yale state the following

“We estimate that the benefits of each additional cloth mask worn by the public are conservatively in the $3,000-$6,000 range due to their impact in slowing the spread of the virus. The benefits of each medical mask for healthcare personnel may be hundreds of times larger, and there is an ethical imperative to safeguard frontline healthcare workers. We must both encourage universal mask adoption and deal with the urgent policy priority that front-line healthcare workers face shortages of personal protective equipment, such as N95 respirators and surgical masks.”

A few addition references regarding mask use:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3591312/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5153448/

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29140516/

If you don't have access to a mask right now You can make your own. Here’s the CDC guide followed by additional resources.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/diy-cloth-face-coverings.html

https://www.consumer.org.hk/ws_en/news/2020/covid-19-diymasks

If you prefer to watch a video rather than read here's Jeremy Howard on masks4all:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BoDwXwZXsDI

#masks4al

#Masks4allCanadians

#universalmasking