masks work, hay fever edition

[mindstalk]

Vancouver pollen levels are "VERY HIGH". The named species aren't the ones I've been tested for (but what is one to make of "Cedar, Juniper, etc."?), but I've still been 'enjoying' some itchy eyeballs and nose blowing, especially after opening my windows or being outside unmasked.

Silver lining: I'm getting very good evidence of masks working, as the past two days I've spent 2.5 hours outside without problems. Hell, I seem to be suffering more from pollen leaking into the apartment despite closed windows (or coming off my clothes...) than from being out.

This also makes me more confident that the mask is protecting me from particulates when walking along a car sewer.

Though pollen is kind of easy mode: 10-200 microns.

Relevant papers:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8278371/ (Masks work, 14 patients subjected directly to grass pollen.)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34534761/ (Masks work, pandemic questionnaire)

https://www.jaci-inpractice.org/article/S2213-2198(20)30867-9/fulltext (Masks work, especially for 'intermittent' sufferers, Israeli nurse experiment)

Comments

[mtbc]

Interesting indeed, thank you. You … don't wear glasses, right? So eye protection may not be much relevant.

[mindstalk]

I do wear glasses! Probably did when we were in Boston, though I'm not sure when I went to wearing them full-time. It'd be nice to think that they help vs. covid droplets and pollen, though I did get some soft plastic safety glasses that I haven't tried on yet.

[mtbc]

I'm considering trying my safety glasses henceforth for when I'm having to share an office indoors at work.

Aha, thank you, my memory of you physically is rather hazy so you could well have been wearing glasses. Mostly I remember waiting for that damned bus, heh. I seem to recall at least one paper strongly suggesting that even regular glasses do help against the pandemic, which has helped to reassure me slightly about my youngest having to attend high school in person.

[mindstalk]

Haha, I also remember waiting with you that time.

Just tried the safety things, they smell a bit but do fit over my glasses while touching the skin well, so it's a valid paranoia option.

Yeah, I've probably seen those papers, from early in the pandemic.

[conuly]

Are you rinsing out your eyes after pollen exposure and pre-emptively applying eyedrops?

[mindstalk]

No, I have never done those things.

[conuly]

It helps, considerably. It may also help to cover your hair on pollen-heavy days - you can wash your face and hands, and rinse out your eyes three times a day, but it's more of a hassle to wash your hair that much.

[mindstalk]

Sticking drops in my eyes is probably a last resort... I wear a hat, though I also have longish hair so that probably doesn't help entirely.

Traditional defense was benadryl, then loratadine after the former got sequestered, and not being out as much. Current is loratadine, masks, and an air purifier.

[conuly]

And I suppose you feel the same way about quickly rinsing with water as using drops? I feel you, though it helps a LOT with the symptoms and I can just manage to do it if I keep my eyes closed as I put the drops in. They just sort of trickle in between the lashes.

[mindstalk]

Not sure what the rinsing means. I have washed the outside of my eyes (eyelids), gets some cool feeling and probably washes off any residual pollen around the eyes. But yeah, I haven't really tried to get water into my eyes, and am not sure how without a chem lab fountain, or trying to stand open-eyed in the shower.

My defenses theoretically also include "don't be somewhere during pollen season" but I failed that in 2019, getting hay fever twice (DC, Melbourne), and my nomadism is constrained right now.

[conuly]

You can buy eyewash cups (and sterile solution!) at drugstores but tbh I mostly just go to the bathroom, lean over the sink, cup some water in my hands and then... idk, immerse my eyes in the water in my hands, maybe blink a few times? It's pollen, not nuclear waste, I don't think it's necessary to do more than that.

But to be even *more* honest, if I don't have a water fountain when out and about I don't mind drinking water from the sink exactly that way, and I know some people think it's very strange if you don't use a cup.

(These statements are equally honest.)

[squirrelitude]

Pollen is *definitely* easy mode. It's pretty easy to make out the shape of it under our low-power dissecting 'scope, and I can see some individual grains with the naked eye.

[mindstalk]

Heh, I see mixed results for "smallest detectable size", but 50-100 microns yeah.

The mask materials can probably filter everything, so I guess the main issue is leakage around imperfect edges, which is probably harder for such big particles.