Cloth masks (mouth-nose covering, everyday masks)
Cloth masks are mostly masks made of commercially available fabric and diverse in their design. Often they are self-sewn and thus do not meet the legal and normative requirements with regard to their filter or protective properties. Therefore, they may not be advertised as medical devices or protective equipment. Now also available in drugstores, they are therefore mostly used in a private setting.
The advantage of this type of mask is that, if they are made of cotton, they are easily washable at high temperatures and spice up everyday life in a colorful way. Masks made of fabric reduce the speed of the respiratory flow and thus the droplet output. At the same time, the cloth mask catches virus-contaminated droplets. These masks also prevent you from unconsciously touching your nose or mouth with your hands, allowing viruses to enter the body. It is important to have a good fit so that the side of the face is also covered.
The disadvantage: This type of mask does not protect against aerosols, i.e. fine suspended particles that can also contain pathogens such as SARS-CoV-2. In addition, their filter performance varies greatly, depending on the material from which the mask was sewn and designed. Medical protective masks (surgical masks)
Medical protective masks, also known as surgical masks or mouth-nose protection (MNS), are disposable medical devices. Their manufacture and distribution are subject to medical device law. Therefore, they must also comply with certain medical requirements and the European standard before they can be affixed with the CE marking.
Indispensable in everyday hospital or practice life, they protect above all the other person from infectious droplets in the breathing air of the mouth guard wearer. A certain self-protection is only given here if the protective mask fits as tightly as possible to the facial contour. At the same time, the protective mask prevents infectious droplets from landing on the mouth and nose.
Surgical masks are easily recognizable by their rectangular design with drapery. They are multi-layered made of special plastics that have certain properties. In between, a special filter fleece (“meltblown fleece”) is embedded. On the outside they are mostly green or blue and white on the inside. Through the ear loops and the wire nosepiece, the protective mask finds its secure hold on the face.
Compared to the more filtering protective masks such as FFP protective masks, surgical masks are more comfortable to wear because the material offers less resistance when inhaled. Disposable makeshift masks are easy to confuse with surgical masks. As a rule, these are not subject to any legal standards or monitoring and thus have a different filter performance than the surgical protective masks. An important distinguishing feature is that these masks do not carry CE marking. FFP protective masks
Protective masks that filter particles, so-called FFP masks (Filtering Face Piece), are part of personal protective equipment (PPE) and disposable products as part of occupational health and safety. They are easy to recognize by their “coffee filter shape” and protect their wearers from particles, droplets and aerosols thanks to their special filtering fleece. They must sit firmly over the mouth and nose and fit firmly against the contour of the face. Especially this point is to be considered with beard wearers, already a three-day beard can reduce the protective effect. Correctly applied FFP protective masks offer external protection mainly if they do not have an exhalation valve. This is because the aerosols are only slowed down and swirled to a certain extent via the valve, but not intercepted.
FFP protective masks are available in two filter classes. While FFP2 masks Face mask should filter at least 94 percent of aerosols according to European standards, FFP3 masks must do so at least 99 percent.
Since FFP protective masks offer a high resistance, many – especially older people – find it difficult to breathe through these protective masks. For these people, the variant with valve is the better option – with less external protection.KN95 and N95 protective masks
The Chinese standard KN95 protective masks essentially meets the requirements of the US protective masks N95. These filter 95 percent of the breathing air. As they offer a high level of protection against SARS-CoV-2, Europe imported Chinese protective masks to bridge the shortage of protective masks. However, neither the Chinese KN95 nor the American N95 protective masks are subject to EU certification.
In order to ensure the conformity of these protective masks with the FFP protective masks on the European market, they have been tested according to the Test Principle for Corona SARS-Cov-2 Pandemic Respirators (CPA). After this CPA rapid test, dealers were allowed to dispense KN95 and N95 protective masks as corona pandemic respirators even without the European CE certificates.