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WorkSafe, Emergency Management Victoria and Victoria Police have made it clear that they will crack down hard on businesses flouting the new mask rules. The latest figures show that about 80 per cent of Victoria’s COVID cases since May were the result of workplace transmission, including private-sector aged care1. A new Victorian directive, from midnight on Wednesday 22 July, means that people in metropolitan Melbourne and Mitchell Shire will have to wear a mask. Regardless of whether your staff are able to be socially distant from each other, they will need to wear a mask at work if there is more than one person on site. An inspection and enforcement blitz will be carried out in workplaces across the state.
A recent article in the medical journal The Lancet2 reported that masks and respirators reduced the risk of COVID infection by 85%. Even when factoring in imperfections and human error, the Victorian Chief Health Officer has said that wearing face masks can reduce transmission of coronavirus by around 60 per cent.
Victoria’s Chief Health Officer Professor Brett Sutton said “With a virus this infectious, every bit helps and the simple action of wearing a facemask will help protect your family, your neighbours and the most vulnerable in our community.”3
The Lancet’s study called ‘Physical distancing, face masks, and eye protection for prevention of COVID-19’ systematically reviewed 172 observational studies and rigorously synthesised available evidence from 44 comparative studies on SARS, Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), COVID-19, and the betacoronaviruses that cause these diseases. It is an important milestone in our understanding of the use of personal protective equipment (PPE) and physical distancing for COVID-19.
As well as reporting that masks reduced the risk of transmission, they highlighted the importance of physical distancing and showed that it led to a reduction in risk of 82% with a physical distance of 1 m in both health-care and community settings.
You can read about the Lancet study here
The term ‘mask’ includes cloth masks and single-use facemasks (commonly called surgical masks).
The Lancet reported that multilayer masks are more protective than are single layer masks. A well designed cloth mask should have water-resistant fabric, multiple layers, and a good facial fit.
The Australian Institute of Occupational Hygienists, the Australian Institute of Health + Safety and the Indoor Air Quality Association Australia, backed by the ACTU, have released a useful guide called ‘A Guide to Buying P2, or Equivalent, Respirators for use in the Australian & New Zealand Work Environment’.
This guide was developed to assist those who purchase disposable P2 respirators in Australia and New Zealand for use in the workplace. They identified that non-compliant products present challenges for businesses purchasing respirators for their workers, as the processes and checkpoints that provide compliance can be complex.
Safe Work Australia also has some very useful information on their website about the different types of masks and how to use them. This information will no doubt be updated during the coming week but it currently emphasizes that you must provide appropriate training and instruction on how to put on, wear, remove and dispose of the mask. Fit testing is also very important to ensure that the mask is effective.
The WHO provide these as a guide for how to use masks correctly.
The Lancet study reiterates that no one intervention is completely protective and that combinations of physical distancing, face mask use, and other interventions are needed to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic until we have an effective vaccine.
References
1 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-07-19/workplace-coronavirus-transmission-in-victoria-in-aged-care/12470704
2 https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)31183-1/fulltext
3 https://www.premier.vic.gov.au/face-masks-to-help-fight-coronavirus-in-victoria/
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