the maskers comic presents

what does this have to do with covid-19 infection control?

One person's "fire" used to easily become an entire neighborhoods fire, and entire communities disaster. Same with COVID-19 infections. We can prevent and minimize destruction in the same ways he did. In our communities. 

We can make masked community schools, we can bring in and set up purifiers. We can hire out businesses for masked days or events, where the staff would wear respirators on those days. We can get research and hospitals set up projects that will interest insurance companies and the government, that translate into money and health of the population. Because just like it does save money to not have fires and destruction, to keep a healthy working population, to prevent or quickly stop a fire rather than clean up burned buildings, take care of burn victims, bury bodies and provide for those families what they lost, it also saves money to prevent COVID-19 infections and outbreaks.

For Ben and fires, it all started with inspiration from a community in action. Ben Franklin's "On Protection of Towns from Fires" was inspired by having seen Boston and London’s firefighting systems first (not official departments, but the seeds of ideas for them). He got others to understand why with 10 words: "An Ounce of Protection is Worth a Pound of Cure". His idea of organizing and training teams of people to provide mutual aid led to Ben Franklin and nineteen of his neighbors founding the Union Fire Company, where they collectively purchased and maintained more expensive technologies, and individually purchased household safety goods. It led to safety protocols and standards, and to the Philadelphia Contributionship, America’s first property insurance company. This helped push for safer building standards, protected member households from fire, underwrote mortgages, and further led to government to learn from it. (http://www.benfranklin300.org/exhibition/_html/3_2/index.htm)  And then eventually the city provided fire departments and it grew to the community service we know of today. We can do this for infection control. 

First check out Air Support Projects Airwareness App to see how increasing air filtration and ventilation (airflow) from 1 ACH to 12 ACH significantly reduces the infectious doses in a classroom and reduced risk by almost half. This type of reduction makes masks more effective, and reduces transmission. Reducing transmission of COVID-19 will reduce short-term and long-term impacts, such as long COVID, which are now being allowed to run rampant with devastating effects on our communities. Keep scrolling through this page to see what communities are doing around the world to fight back. 

Infection Prevention in

WORK settings

Workers have been fighting for rights to infection control codes and standards in their workspaces, as well as protective measures and support.

Infection Prevention in

School settings

Parents, students, staff, and concerned community members have been fighting for rights to infection control standards in schools. See the resources below to find out what has been done/ can be done to protect your schools!

how did we get here?

how do politics and economics play a role in policy-making?

Infection Prevention in

Healthcare settings

There has been a large outcry for better infection prevention in healthcare facilities after many places dropped mask requirements. 

Infection Prevention in

Home settings

People have made changes to their homes after health crises in the past, including creating better ventilation, sick/isolation rooms, and rooms for guests to wash up in (reduce infection risks).  Learn more in this section, and find out what you can do to make your home a safer space!