https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/23/mit-researchers-say-youre-no-safer-from-covid-indoors-at-6-feet-or-60-feet-in-new-study.html

 

Quote

The risk of being exposed to Covid-19 indoors is as great at 60 feet as it is at 6 feet — even when wearing a mask, according to a new study by Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers who challenge social distancing guidelines adopted across the world.

MIT professors Martin Z. Bazant, who teaches chemical engineering and applied mathematics, and John W.M. Bush, who teaches applied mathematics, developed a method of calculating exposure risk to Covid-19 in an indoor setting that factors in a variety of issues that could affect transmission, including the amount of time spent inside, air filtration and circulation, immunization, variant strains, mask use, and even respiratory activity such as breathing, eating, speaking or singing.

 

Bazant and Bush question long-held Covid-19 guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization in a peer-reviewed study published earlier this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science of the United States of America.

"We argue there really isn’t much of a benefit to the 6-foot rule, especially when people are wearing masks,” Bazant said in an interview. "It really has no physical basis because the air a person is breathing while wearing a mask tends to rise and comes down elsewhere in the room so you’re more exposed to the average background than you are to a person at a distance.”

The important variable the CDC and the WHO have overlooked is the amount of time spent indoors, Bazant said. The longer someone is inside with an infected person, the greater the chance of transmission, he said.

Opening windows or installing new fans to keep the air moving could also be just as effective or more effective than spending large amounts of money on a new filtration system, he said.

Bazant also says that guidelines enforcing indoor occupancy caps are flawed. He said 20 people gathered inside for 1 minute is probably fine, but not over the course of several hours, he said.

 

"What our analysis continues to show is that many spaces that have been shut down in fact don’t need to be. Often times the space is large enough, the ventilation is good enough, the amount of time people spend together is such that those spaces can be safely operated even at full capacity and the scientific support for reduced capacity in those spaces is really not very good,” Bazant said. "I think if you run the numbers, even right now for many types of spaces you’d find that there is not a need for occupancy restrictions.”

Six-feet social distancing rules that inadvertently result in closed businesses and schools are "just not reasonable,” according to Bazant.

"This emphasis on distancing has been really misplaced from the very beginning. The CDC or WHO have never really provided justification for it, they’ve just said this is what you must do and the only justification I’m aware of, is based on studies of coughs and sneezes, where they look at the largest particles that might sediment onto the floor and even then it’s very approximate, you can certainly have longer or shorter range, large droplets,” Bazant said.

"The distancing isn’t helping you that much and it’s also giving you a false sense of security because you’re as safe at 6 feet as you are at 60 feet if you’re indoors. Everyone in that space is at roughly the same risk, actually,” he noted.

Pathogen-laced droplets travel through the air indoors when people talk, breathe or eat. It is now known that airborne transmission plays a huge role in the spread of Covid-19, compared with the earlier months of the pandemic where hand-washing was considered the leading recommendation to avoid transmission.

Those droplets from one’s warm exhalation mix with body heat and air currents in the area to rise and travel throughout the entire room, no matter how socially distanced a person is. People seem to be more exposed to that "background” air than they are by droplets from a distance, according to the study.

For example, if someone infected with Covid-19 is wearing a mask and singing loudly in an enclosed room, a person who is sitting at the other side of the room is not more protected than someone who is sitting just six feet away from the infected person. This is why time spent in the enclosed area is more important than how far you are from the infected person.

Masks work in general to prevent transmission by blocking larger droplets, therefore larger droplets aren’t making up the majority of Covid infections because most people are wearing masks. The majority of people who are transmitting Covid aren’t coughing and sneezing, they’re asymptomatic.

Masks also work to prevent indoor transmission by blocking direct plumes of air, best visualized by imagining someone exhaling smoke. Constant exposure to direct plumes of infectious air would result in a higher risk of transmission, though exposure to direct plumes of exhaled air doesn’t usually last long.

Even with masks on, as with smoking, those who are in the vicinity are heavily affected by the secondhand smoke that makes its way around the enclosed area and lingers. The same logic applies to infectious airborne droplets, according to the study. When indoors and masked, factors besides distance can be more important to consider to avoid transmission.

As for social distancing outdoors, Bazant says it makes almost no sense and that doing so with masks on is "kind of crazy.”

"If you look at the air flow outside, the infected air would be swept away and very unlikely to cause transmission. There are very few recorded instances of outdoor transmission.” he said. "Crowded spaces outdoor could be an issue, but if people are keeping a reasonable distance of like 3 feet outside, I feel pretty comfortable with that even without masks frankly.”

Bazant says this could possibly explain why there haven’t been spikes in transmission in states like Texas or Florida that have reopened businesses without capacity limits.

As for variant strains that are 60% more transmissible, increasing ventilation by 60%, reducing the amount of time spent inside or limiting the number of people indoors could offset that risk.

Bazant also said that a big question that is coming will be when masks can be removed, and that the study’s guidelines can help quantify the risks involved. He also noted that measuring carbon dioxide in a room can also help quantify how much infected air is present and hence risk of transmission.

"We need scientific information conveyed to the public in a way that is not just fearmongering but is actually based in analysis,” Bazant said. After three rounds of heavy peer review, he said it’s the most review he’s ever been through, and that now that it’s published he hopes it will influence policy.

 

On 4/23/2021 at 7:55 AM, sameaglesfan said:

I think (and this is only my opinion) that you may have this backwards.  The supporters of Trump made Trump - Trump did not make the supporters.  If this jackwagon comes out in support of the vaccine, his people would only think that he has lost his mind.  

Trump was/is an idiot - but I think he is the product of the times and not the wind of change that he imagines himself to be.

I think it's absurd to act like people don't listen to Trump. He said the election was rigged with zero evidence, and about half the country believed him. 

34 minutes ago, BirdsFanBill said:

How did this become the fitness thread for fat people who want to get fit? What's going on here lately.

 

Anyway, had a bbq with a few friends who are all at some level of vaccination on Saturday. Was so great to be with people again. 

I keep forgetting that there are people that have actually avoided social interaction for over a year. Whenever I read a post like this, it surprises me. 

OK, which one of you is this?

 

Getting my first vaccine tomorrow. Hoping to grow wings instead of a third arm. 

4 minutes ago, Kz! said:

I keep forgetting that there are people that have actually avoided social interaction for over a year. Whenever I read a post like this, it surprises me. 

I would say likely over half of the country's population did this.... wifey and I are back to eating dinner outdoors and indoors with full immunization but when we take the kids, it's only outdoors.  Some people we talk with are still not comfortable eating indoors even though they are fully vaxed.

 

11 minutes ago, DEagle7 said:

It's a complete lack of understanding of epidemiology and I'm done doing your homework for you. 

Convinced a patient and 2 parents to get vaccinated already today!  Feeling pretty good ethically right now!

Complete lack of raw numbers right in front of your face and you're still trying to vaccinate toddlers 😂😂😂

More likely to die from leukemia than covid. And MVA. And suicide. And and and and....

Got my first Moderna Saturday.  No site pain, tetanus shot was worse.  Got home about 2 hours after the shot, took a 3 hour nap.  Other than the nap, no side effects at all.

12 minutes ago, mr_irie1 said:

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/23/mit-researchers-say-youre-no-safer-from-covid-indoors-at-6-feet-or-60-feet-in-new-study.html

 

 

Let me tell you how shocked I am.

They knew this from the onset when they looked at cruise lines. People that were at the same table were seemingly unaffected, but four tables away were catching it due to airflow.

4 minutes ago, IFB DOG said:

Complete lack of raw numbers right in front of your face and you're still trying to vaccinate toddlers 😂😂😂

More likely to die from leukemia than covid. And MVA. And suicide. And and and and....

and car accidents and slipping and falling in your bathtub. . .

Also, if you need help understanding the difference between contagious diseases spread through air or contact and cancer, just look it up.

12 minutes ago, Kz! said:

I keep forgetting that there are people that have actually avoided social interaction for over a year. Whenever I read a post like this, it surprises me. 

Yeah. Well the wife and I were trying to get pregnant, and then did. So we were more careful than most I'd say. 

'

1 minute ago, Toastrel said:

and car accidents and slipping and falling in your bathtub. . .

Also, if you need help understanding the difference between contagious diseases spread through air or contact and cancer, just look it up.

Look up MVA.

15 minutes ago, Kz! said:

OK, which one of you is this?

 

That's me.

You have to admit, I have a beautiful voice.

11 minutes ago, Smokesdawg said:

I would say likely over half of the country's population did this.... wifey and I are back to eating dinner outdoors and indoors with full immunization but when we take the kids, it's only outdoors.  Some people we talk with are still not comfortable eating indoors even though they are fully vaxed.

 

I'd guess much, much lower than 50% actually did. Even the most devote Covid people I know still pretty much cheated whenever they felt like it. Trips to the hair salon, non-essential shopping, dining out. Sure, they'd talk a big game about masks and social distancing, but if they found something they really wanted to do, they wouldn't skip it. 

5 minutes ago, BirdsFanBill said:

Yeah. Well the wife and I were trying to get pregnant, and then did. So we were more careful than most I'd say. 

'

Oh, nice. Congrats! That's an acceptable reason in my book. 

1 minute ago, Kz! said:

I'd guess much, much lower than 50% actually did. Even the most devote Covid people I know still pretty much cheated whenever they felt like it. Trips to the hair salon, non-essential shopping, dining out. Sure, they'd talk a big game about masks and social distancing, but if they found something they really wanted to do, they wouldn't skip it. 

I call BS.  No way you know people.

1 minute ago, Kz! said:

Oh, nice. Congrats! That's an acceptable reason in my book. 

Thanks! Yeah we just didn't know what risks there were with everything so we we're definitely a different level of cautious than we would have been otherwise. But became less hermit like as more and more info came out. Now that were both vaccinated though we are back to licking all the shopping carts at Giant and eating off the top of Wawa trash cans. 

18 minutes ago, IFB DOG said:

Complete lack of raw numbers right in front of your face and you're still trying to vaccinate toddlers 😂😂😂

More likely to die from leukemia than covid. And MVA. And suicide. And and and and....

And I try to prevent those too. Pretty simple stuff. 

6 hours ago, DEagle7 said:

Convinced a patient and 2 parents to get vaccinated already today!  Feeling pretty good ethically right now!

 

Keep doing the Lord's work!

It helps being naturally reclusive, but we really pretty much stuck to the guidances. Had a single friend over to visit a few times back in the summer to hang mostly outdoors and a couple of times to watch games and election night, but election night was the last time we had company. We pretty much modeled the shutdowns and self-quarantined through the holidays except for some very limited, local family gatherings. No bars, no indoor dining of any kind. We did outdoor dining a few times during our summer vacation, but mostly just take out otherwise, and we really only did that a handful of times. We've been living well, and it feels good to be so self-sufficient. I've saved so much money just cooking at home, and the food I make is better than about 95% of anything we can get at a restaurant. Just about everyone in our circle is vaccinated now, though, so we figure to be gradually making contact with some folks as we get into the nice weather.

30 minutes ago, DEagle7 said:

And I try to prevent those too. Pretty simple stuff. 

Let me know when you cure death.

1 hour ago, Gannan said:

I think it's absurd to act like people don't listen to Trump. He said the election was rigged with zero evidence, and about half the country believed him. 

Did they?

Or is that your interpretation?

7 minutes ago, sameaglesfan said:

Did they?

Or is that your interpretation?

I don't know about half the country but polling bears out that a vast majority of the Republican Party believed him.  And aside from polling, anecdotal evidence backs it as well as the fact that a huge number of Republicans protested the election and thousands of them, you know, broke into the Capital building to kill the Vice President.

5 minutes ago, sameaglesfan said:

Did they?

Or is that your interpretation?

Polling suggests a significant majority of Republican voters believe there was widespread election fraud, despite there being zero evidence for it.

There IS evidence for isolated cases of fraud, but those were Republicans passing off fraudulent votes for Trump at least here in PA. 

"Half the country" is probably overstating it, considering less than half voted for Trump*, and that based on polling somewhere around 2/3 to 3/4 of Republicans believe there was widespread fraud. So we'll call it 1/3 of the nation "believed" Trump, based on that.

 

*