Wearing face masks in certain countries such as China and Japan have been worn long before the pandemic, for protection against the high levels of pollution as well as over populated areas such as India and even in big cities in the UK such as London where germs and infections can be easily spread.

Across the UK however, unless you have underlying health conditions such as severe cystic fibrosis which can be deadly, mask wearing is a relatively new thing that has been enforced to every member of the public during the pandemic. Becoming law to wear one on any public transport and inside any public spaces such as shopping centres and stores. Although this new law in place has had many conflicting opinions, here at The Face Mask Store, we have been working twice as hard to provide the public with high quality, high protection masks and respirators, both reusable and disposable - and we don’t see an end in the need for masks any time soon.

Face Mask Types

A variety of PPE has been used over the course of the pandemic to protect not only the general public but health care and key workers also. These protect against other infectious diseases as well as COVID-19.

• FFP3 Mask - An FFP3 mask offers the highest level of protection and high levels of filtration from 99% of particles*. They are the equivalent of N99 face masks.
• FFP2 Mask - FFP2 masks still offer relatively high protection from unwanted particles, they have a minimum of 94% filtration percentage*. They are the equivalent of N95 face masks. 
• FFP1 Mask - The FFP1 is the least filtering mask of the three. They have a minimum of 80% filtration percentage*. It is mainly used as a dust mask in specific situations such as certain light woodworking.

*(https://www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrpdf/rr619.pdf)

Post Covid

Even after you have been vaccinated, the government is expected to still advise the public to continue wearing masks. This is due to the amount of other germs and infections that have decreased during the pandemic. In the UK alone, it is known that flu cases have dropped dramatically since the enforcement of mask wearing.

Although we know the vaccines are around 90% effective, it is still unknown as to whether people with the vaccines can still pass covid to others. Mask wearing will also help prevent the spread of any Covid variants. So continuing to wear masks will be a thing of the future, at least for a little while. Anything from IIR type masks to FFP3 masks will help prevent any germs spreading from person to person.

The advice from the CDC (Centres for disease control) is to continue social distancing and wearing masks, whilst they are unsure if and when they will recommend that masks are no longer needed. This is due to the lack of information that is currently available for them to make these valid decisions.

Here at The Face Mask Store, we stock varying types of masks from half face, to full face respirators, to varying levels of protection. Shop here today.