Doctors Urge Greater Use of Masks

With today’s additional relaxation of restrictions on business activity and social gatherings comes the potential for increased spread of the COVID-19 virus, and medical professionals are urging heightened individual vigilance to keep transmission in check.

Physicians from the University of Kansas Health System said today that as more people return to business settings and venture out from shelter-at-home directives, they should exercise basic caution and use face masks, be more alert to social distancing practices and continue to emphasize personal hygiene by frequently washing their hands, using hand sanitizers and avoiding touching their faces.

All of those steps, said medical director Stephen Stites, reflected choices that people must make to keep the virus in check, even though there are still no guarantees against transmission. “It’s a matter of relative risk vs. absolute safety,” he said.

The mask issue is becoming particularly significant, they noted, especially after an outbreak at the White House, where members of the administration have been criticized for not regularly wearing masks.

Joining Stites and infection-control medical director Dana Hawkinson for a news briefing this morning was Amanda Gartner, the hospital’s infection-control director. She clarified that the use of masks isn’t a matter of personal protection; rather, it’s a matter of personal responsibility to others to help protect them from any viral particles the wearer might be shedding, especially if unaware that they have been infected.

“They are meant to protect others from you if you can’t maintain distances,” Hawkinson said, concurring.

He offered an update on the hospital’s daily census for COVID-19 cases: “We’re sitting at 28 admissions as of early this morning, with 11 in ICU,” he said. That suggests the hospital has reached a relative equilibrium of between 20 and 30 daily cases, which if maintained would provide sufficient capacity for managing new cases.