A doctor has demonstrated why wearing a mask makes a difference during the coronavirus pandemic. This comes after a clip from the popular TV show Parks and Recreation went viral on Twitter, intercutting scenes from the show with footage from real-life town hall meetings where people are complaining about having to wear facemasks to keep themselves and others safe. Medical professionals are now taking to social media to dispel the myth that wearing facemasks negatively affects a person's oxygen levels. [[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/amandadeibert/status/1276348051490103296]] One of these professionals is microbiologist Rich Davis, who shared a demonstration on Twitter that revealed how a mask can keep a person safe by halting the spread of respiratory droplets. He captioned the post: "What does a mask do? Blocks respiratory droplets coming from your mouth and throat." "Two simple demos: First, I sneezed, sang, talked & coughed toward an agar culture plate with or without a mask. Bacteria colonies show where droplets landed. A mask blocks virtually all of them." [[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/richdavisphd/status/1276629360212979712]] The demonstration involved Dr. Davis holding a series of cultures close to hid face snd sneezing, coughing, and talking onto them. As you can see, the prevalence of bacteria presence significantly decreases when he wears a mask. [[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/richdavisphd/status/1276629360212979712/photo/1]] [[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/richdavisphd/status/1276629360212979712/photo/2]] Dr. Davis also provided a demonstration of how a mask can be more effective when coupled with social distancing. He wrote: "What about keeping your distance? "Second demo: I set open bacteria culture plates 2, 4 and 6 feet away and coughed (hard) for ~15s. I repeated this without a mask. As seen by number of bacteria colonies, droplets mostly landed <6 ft, but a mask blocked nearly all of them." [[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/richdavisphd/status/1276629364067536897]] Per the <a href="https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html">John Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center</a>, at the time of writing, there have been 10,302,867 confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus worldwide, and a global death toll of 505,518.

Doctor demonstrates why wearing a mask makes a difference

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