Yes but be careful of semantics & absolutist rhetoric. Many ppl don't understand what airborne/aerosol actually means IRL re: SARS2 spread. It's a complex topic that defies simplistic explanations. Even Carl Zimmer wisely shows the "virus in a tiny drop"https://twitter.com/jeffreytran/status/1473097037935792135?s=20 …
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Replying to @macroliter @zeynep and
I agree that many people don't understand what airborne transmission means. We have written a paper explaining common misconceptions (and another one soon-to-appear in
@TheLancet as a response)https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhin.2020.12.022 …2 replies 6 retweets 21 likes -
Replying to @jljcolorado @macroliter and
This is also a good one: https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n913 …pic.twitter.com/NjBIouGf5s
1 reply 0 retweets 13 likes -
Replying to @jljcolorado @macroliter and
I also agree on misunderstandings, why I spent so much time writing public articles on multiple aspects of this. Today, I went into a post-office, and saw these people working behind non-airtight plastic barrier with terrible masks, doors closed, no HEPA. This isn't semantics.
3 replies 2 retweets 32 likes -
Replying to @zeynep @jljcolorado and
A correct understanding of the transmission mechanism would empower people, direct investment to correct mitigations, assuage fears, encourage outdoors (instead of stupid beach shaming) and help with other respiratory diseases. We aren't into Twitter battles for the fun of it.
1 reply 17 retweets 78 likes -
Replying to @zeynep @jljcolorado and
There were elderly people in there with me, and I was the only one wearing an N95, amidst the Omicron wave in NYC and when we know elderly will have especially difficult time fending off antibody evading variants. Nobody has been explaining this to people. TWO YEARS IN.
7 replies 4 retweets 54 likes -
Replying to @zeynep @jljcolorado and
The amount of money and effort spent doing incorrect mitigations like plexiglass that can increase infections when HEPA filters never sell out? When there's been no official effort to help people avoid the flood of counterfeit N95s? Nobody is upset because of personal obsession.
2 replies 11 retweets 52 likes -
Replying to @zeynep @jljcolorado and
I do get upset when people think this is some minor obsession. It's about explaining the correct transmission mechanism, that it is airborne understood correctly, so people can better protect themselves, and we can do the best possible mitigations with our limited resources.
3 replies 5 retweets 32 likes -
Replying to @zeynep @jljcolorado and
The science of it is very interesting, will clearly be relevant to other respiratory diseases, and I found the sociology of science aspect fascinating. But frankly, if WHO and the CDC had found a way to do the right thing, I wouldn't care if they called it tiny things you inhale.
2 replies 1 retweet 22 likes -
Replying to @zeynep @jljcolorado and
The rest—correcting the aerosol micron cutoff boundary, tracing history of the error, sociology of anti-miasma efforts turning into incorrect scientific dogma... All that could wait, *if* the public health authorities had found their way to the correct message and mitigations.
3 replies 2 retweets 22 likes
But they have not, because today, amidst all this in NYC, I'm watching elderly people enter an enclosed, unventilated space with very limited protection, unprotected essential workers, and little awareness, even. That's why it matters. It's bigger than anyone's personal feelings.
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