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By: Danielle Da Silva Posted: 11:38 AM CST Wednesday, Dec. 22, 2021 Last Modified: 7:43 PM CST Wednesday, Dec. 22, 2021 | Updates
MIKAELA MACKENZIE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Epidemiologist Cynthia Carr demonstrates wearing a KN95 mask, which is recommended to combat the omicron variant.
The fast-spreading Omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus has led Winnipeg’s RRC Polytech to mandate high-quality masks on campus in the new year, and infectious-disease experts are warning that cloth face coverings may not offer adequate protection.
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The fast-spreading Omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus has led Winnipeg’s RRC Polytech to mandate high-quality masks on campus in the new year, and infectious-disease experts are warning that cloth face coverings may not offer adequate protection.
Students and staff at RRC Polytech will be required to don either a medical grade or KN95 mask, or an N95 respirator, typically reserved for health-care providers working with the most infectious airborne diseases.
The college-issued masks will be provided free to students, staff, faculty and visitors. The school has a supply of about 30,000 masks.
Cloth masks, given the variation in material, fit and ability to filter out viral particles, are less than ideal, Winnipeg epidemiologist Cynthia Carr said. And while the common, three-ply surgical masks are a better option, they do not always fit tightly to the face.
"We still want to block those big messy droplets if someone is near you coughing or sneezing," Carr said. "But we are understanding more and more that you don’t necessarily have to come in contact directly with those droplets. It can be the aerosol particles that are also helping with this spread.
"You don’t want to let any of those particles potentially come into your airway."
RRC Polytech was the first post-secondary institution in the province to ban non-medical and cloth masks on campus, said Jodi Pluchinski, the school’s director of safety health services.
"We, like everyone else, have been making sure that we’re following Health Canada guidelines and recommendations and really staying on that leading edge of implementing the COVID-19 safety and health measures," Pluchinski said.
"We’ve always either met or exceeded public-health guidelines, and so for us, when we looked at what we wanted to do, it wasn’t a difficult decision, it was the right decision."
Pluchinski said the new mask requirement was brought on by the arrival of the highly infectious Omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus and builds on guidance from the Public Health Agency of Canada regarding aerosol spread.
Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam has likened the ability of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, to linger in the air to that of second-hand cigarette smoke. The Public Health Agency of Canada has since recommended people at higher risk of severe disease or exposure use medical masks and consider the use of respirators.
An increasing number of Canadian doctors and infectious-disease experts have also called for wider use of medical masks and respirators in light of Omicron and the growing body of evidence that COVID-19 can be airborne. Generally, respirators such as N95s fit securely to a person’s face and can filter out up to 95 per cent of infectious particles in the air.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization has also updated its mask guidance to recommend people 60 and older or with underlying conditions wear medical masks and if members of the general public do not have access to medical masks, reusable masks should meet certain standards.
"Anything that’s loose fitting should absolutely be avoided and you should be looking at the best fit possible that’s secure around your nose, mouth, chin and solid against your cheeks," Carr said. Scarfs and neck gaiters should not be used as a face covering.
Manitobans can also consider layering the surgical masks with their cloth masks to achieve a secure fit, if medical masks and respirators are not available, Carr said.
Dr. Philippe Lagacé-Wiens, a medical microbiology professor at the University of Manitoba, said masks with vents or valves should never be used for COVID-19 purposes because they do not filter exhaled air.
"They do nothing to protect the public. They are close to no mask at all," Lagacé-Wiens said.
Current provincial public-health guidance states that COVID-19 mainly spreads by coming into contact with an infected person’s respiratory droplets.
People should wear non-medical masks made with tightly woven material with at least two layers of material that cover a person’s nose and mouth and fit securely with no gaps, according to the province.
Parent Aleeza Gerstein said the lack of updated guidance from the government on the airborne quality of COVID-19 and mask use is dismaying.
"People deserve to have current information available to them and there is a lot of current information that we’re not keeping up with," said Gerstein, a microbiology professor at the University of Manitoba. "We’re still living in this 2020 world of cloth masks and hand-washing here, and I don’t know why we haven’t iterated our policies."
Gerstein said her family has used N95 masks consistently since last summer and sends her son to school with a child-sized N95 mask. But on Monday, Gerstein said her son returned home wearing a simple cloth mask that had been provided by the school.
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The mask swap, she said, was a result of the school division distributing donated masks to classrooms.
"I think the Winnipeg School Division should have had an expert immediately look at this and say we cannot be sending the signal to parents that this is a high-quality mask that our children should be wearing," Gerstein said.
Deputy chief provincial public health officer Dr. Jazz Atwal said work is underway to update the province’s mask and transmission guidance. Meanwhile, the government began distributing free KN95 masks to the public at Liquor Marts and casinos on Wednesday.
"It is worrisome that it is spreading so fast and it is worrisome that it is two to four times more infectious compared to Delta," Atwal said.
"We’re working with our national colleagues in relation to this to understand transmission related to Omicron and what prevention looks like, what PPE looks like in that."
danielle.dasilva@freepress.mb.ca
Danielle Da Silva is a general assignment reporter.
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Updated on Wednesday, December 22, 2021 at 12:30 PM CST: Adds further detail, updates headline, photo.
6:20 PM: Adds full writethru with additional quotes and new photos
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