My years in cleanrooms and a postdoc in a shared appointment in biochemistry have taught me to see gloves as contamination distributors.

It's literally not okay to be wearing gloves in a chemistry/biochemistry building when you push an elevator button.

Yes, of course you remove and trash gloves to avoid contamination. I did biochemistry for years. We wore gloves to protect proteins in samples from our proteases, and to protect ourselves from radionuclides. When I labeled stuff with mCi levels of I-125, I worked in a fume hood, behind lead bricks, wearing a lead apron, and three layers of PVC gloves.

But I always tossed the gloves before leaving the work area. And usually I'd put on fresh gloves before removing the lead apron.

That wouldn't be workable day to day. You'd probably go through 50-100 gloves per day, doing it right.

I worked in biotech manufacturing with biohazards. 50-100 gloves/person/10hr day is about right.

Presumably that doesn't mean people forgo gloves in the lab though, right? The point is you get them dirty, and then you take them off.

You don't just "take them off". You carefully pull them off, inside out. And then dispose of them, as hazardous waste.

I wore a p95 (similar in performance to the n95) today while shopping. I'm in the Midwest, and the number of looks made me think I had two heads.

My daughter is also sewing cloth mask using a pattern from https://www.craftpassion.com/face-mask-sewing-pattern/

I know these aren't as good, but they probably improve my chances of avoiding SARS-CoV-2 by at least 10% when I have to go outside. I plan on using them once, then leaving them in a bucket in the garage. Once I've used them all up, I'll wash them and by that time (and hopefully the detergent + bleach action), the virus will be dead.

> I know these aren't as good, but they probably improve my chances of avoiding SARS-CoV-2 by at least 10%

It's no better than avoiding personal contact generally.

Not everyone can avoid personal contact. Eventually you'll need to interact to some degree with others when getting groceries etc.

https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/best-materials-make-diy-...

> Eventually you'll need to interact to some degree with others when getting groceries etc.

The main risk when getting groceries, unless people are coughing or sneezing in your face, is transfers from your hands, which a surgical or n95/r95/p95 mask does roughly zero to help with. (Now, getting everyone else to wear such a mask would reduce the odds of them contaminating something that would get on your hands, but that's not a benefit of you wearing mask.)

I disagree with gloves. Gloves may serve as a psychological signal, and they can be put on and taken off, but I haven't heard of hands being an infection route.

Several states fairly recently passed laws requiring food preparers to wear gloves. Then they backtracked when they realized that they actually decreased safety.

Hands are absolutely an infection route, by acting as a transport vehicle to your nose and eyes. Gloves don't change that fact though, unless it reminds you to not touch your face. (It does to me: I work with gloves and epoxy resin a lot, and I've developed a pretty strong reflex to not touch myself with gloved hands even though I do it all the time with bare hands.)

It was on NBC news two nights ago that the virus does not infect you through eyes or blood. It can only infect and replicate in the lungs. So only nose and mouth if that report was correct.

I have no idea whether this particular virus can survive contact with tears and make the journey, but your eyes drain into your nose.