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Subject: [DCHAS-L] Chemical Safety headlines (11 articles)
Date: Wednesday, July 1, 2020 at 7:47:21 AM
Author: DCHAS Membership Chair <membership**At_Symbol_Here**DCHAS.ORG> 		Next by Date:
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Debunking Bad COVID-19 Research
Date: Wed, 1 Jul 2020 09:27:35 -0400
Author: ILPI Support

From: "Stuart, Ralph" <Ralph.Stuart**At_Symbol_Here**KEENE.EDU>
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Musician's union study proposal
Date: Wed, 1 Jul 2020 12:44:33 +0000
Reply-To: ACS Division of Chemical Health and Safety <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**Princeton.EDU>
Message-ID: E70298D7-5A3F-4525-A225-A5DDCBCC148C**At_Symbol_Here**keene.edu


>While wearing a mask is a problem for a singer in performance and everyone expends a tiny amount of extra physical effort to breathing with the masks, they are just not an oxygen issue for normal people.

There's an interesting recent entry in the NIOSH Science Blog entitled "The Physiological Burden of Prolonged PPE Use on Healthcare Workers during Long Shifts" at
https://blogs.cdc.gov/niosh-science-blog/2020/06/10/ppe-burden/

It doesn't discuss surgical masks or cloth masks, but notes:
"An N95 Filtering Facepiece Respirator user is always going to experience some level of difficulty breathing, or breathing resistance, even though these devices are designed to minimize breathing resistance as much as possible. Enough breathing resistance could result in a reduction in the frequency and depth of breathing, known as hypoventilation (the opposite of hyperventilation)."

Personally, it seems unlikely that O2 supply will be a problem, but a build up of CO2 under a cloth mask, along with temperature and humidity could be a problem for some people, based on personal experience. The higher education population is diverse and extrapolating from the health care worker population or other employee sectors to suggest anyone can wear a mask all day could be misleading.

- Ralph

Ralph Stuart, CIH, CCHO
Environmental Safety Manager
Keene State College
603 358-2859

ralph.stuart**At_Symbol_Here**keene.edu

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