May 6, 2020 / By Madeline Farber | Fox News
With some states requiring residents to wear face masks in public to help stop the spread of the novel coronavirus, at least one mask could actually do more harm than good: An N95 respirator, but only if it has a small valve on the front.
The San Francisco Department of Public Health took to Twitter on Monday to remind residents that if they are choosing to wear an N95 (which should ideally be reserved for medical workers on the frontline, officials have stressed), they should ensure it doesn’t have the front valve.
“Still seeing a lot of these masks out there, it’s confusing, because they are called N95 — but the ones with the **valves** or openings on the front are NOT safe, and may actually propel your germs further!” the tweet reads.
N95 is widely used as a protective mask designed to achieve close facial fir with an efficient filtration of airborne particles.