On Sunday morning’s edition of Meet the Press, Chuck Todd asked Jerome Adams, our surgeon general, whether he would recommend that individuals working together wear masks. His answer was no, as long as they are at least 6 feet apart.
One tragedy of the pandemic is missed opportunities. Adams' answer may reflect yet another missed opportunity.
Let me explain.
On March 10, 60 members of a church choral group in Washington state rehearsed for 150 minutes. Three weeks later, 45 were sick with COVID-19 and two had died. This suggests the importance of aerosolized or airborne transmission.
When you sneeze or cough, the virus on larger particles travels a few feet and quickly drops to the ground or onto surfaces. Thus the 6-foot rule.
Those attached to smaller particles are aerosolized and can travel much further and stay in the air for hours. This can occur by simply conversing or, sadly, more lethally by singing.
That we know so little about the spread of COVID-19 so far into the pandemic is a painful reality. We may have overestimated the role of droplet and contact spread and underestimated the role of aerosolized transmission. Because of this, aerosolized spread should have been a key part of Adams' answer.
Yes, saying that working together in confined spaces may be dangerous could mean additional economic hardship. Yet this was a precious opportunity to alert the public to the risk of aerosolized transmission.
We have already seen the tragic results of early opportunities that were missed because of the Trump administration's focus on the economy rather than the looming disaster. Ask anyone who has lost a loved one if a faster economic recovery justifies that loss.
The pandemic will likely begin to recede in the next two to three months. At that time let's begin reviving the economy.
Until then, let's focus on saving lives.
Douglas Douville, M.D., MPH, Salt Lake City