In the light of convincing research evidence that face masks is a great tool to stop community spread of COVID-19, a group of scientists across the world have come together to issue an open letter promoting the use of masks by members of the public.
Arguing that the simple task of wearing a mask reduces transmissibility and thereby mortality, the scientists have pressed for wearing masks, even defining it as any face covering, as a key public health intervention.
The coordinators of the statement are Jeremy Howard, research scientist, University of San Francisco, co-founder fast.ai , member World Economic Forum Global AI Council, and Vincent Rajkumar, Editor-in-Chief, Blood Cancer Journal. The signatories are from North America, Africa, Asia, Oceania, and Europe.
Full text of the open letter:
We have an urgent message about some critical new scientific research. It strongly suggests that requiring fabric mask use in public places could be amongst the most powerful tools to stop the community spread of COVID-19.
An international cross-disciplinary review of the scientific research by 19 experts and other recent research shows that:
- People are most infectious in the initial period of infection, when it is common to have few or no symptoms
- Cloth masks obstruct a high portion of the droplets from the mouth and nose that spread the virus
- Non-medical masks have been effective in reducing transmission of coronavirus
- Cloth masks can be washed in soapy water and re-used
- Places and time periods where mask usage is required or widespread have been shown to substantially lower community transmission
- Public mask wearing is most effective at stopping spread of the virus when the vast majority of the public uses masks
- Laws appear to be highly effective at increasing compliance and slowing or stopping the spread of COVID-19.
The preponderance of evidence, in both laboratory and clinical settings, indicates that mask wearing reduces the transmissibility per contact by reducing transmission of infected droplets. The decreased transmissibility could substantially reduce the death toll, other harms to public health, job losses and economic losses. The cost of such masks is very low by comparison.
Modeling suggests that widespread public mask use, in conjunction with other measures, could bring the effective reproduction number (R) beneath 1.0, thus halting the growth of the pandemic.
Therefore, we ask that government officials require cloth masks to be worn in all public places, such as stores, transportation systems, and public buildings as soon as possible. This action will prevent people who are infectious from unknowingly spreading the disease.
We also ask business leaders who offer products and services to the public to require their employees and customers to wear masks whether or not it is required by local law. This vital step will help protect workers and customers.
Such requirements will greatly increase the rate of mask wearing. This should be done in conjunction with, not as a replacement for, hand hygiene, physical distancing, testing, and contact tracing strategies.
This requirement should be introduced alongside clear guidelines for the production, use and sanitization or re-use of face masks. We urge you to also consider their distribution as shortages allow.
There is no need to wait for availability of medical-grade masks; any face covering, including a piece of cloth, a scarf, bandana, t-shirt, or paper towel, appears to be effective.
Sincerely,
Organizing Signatories
Jeremy Howard : Distinguished research scientist, University of San Francisco, co-founder fast.ai, member World Economic Forum Global AI Council
Dr Vincent Rajkumar : Editor in Chief, Blood Cancer Journal
North American Signatories
Dr Harold Varmus : Nobel Prize-winning virologist; Professor, Weill Cornell Medicine; former Director, NIH and NCI
Dr Bengt Holmström : Nobel Prize-winning economist; Professor, Economics, MIT
Dr Siddhartha Mukherjee : Professor of Medicine, Columbia University Medical Center; Time 100 most influential people; Best-selling author
Dr Eric Topol : Director, Scripps Research Translational Institute; Executive VP & Professor, Molecular Medicine, Scripps Research; Best-selling author
Dr Robert Wachter : Professor, Medicine Chair, UCSF; Chair of Advisory Board, Healthcare Improvement Studies, Univ of Cambridge; Best-selling author
Dr Anne W. Rimoin : Professor, Department of Epidemiology; Director, UCLA Center for Global and Immigrant Health; Director, UCLA-DRC Health Research and Training Program
Dr Erik Brynjolfsson : Professor, MIT Sloan; Senior Fellow, Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI & Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research; Bestselling author.
Dr Diana Romero : Chief Editor, Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology
Dr Sagar Lonial : Chair and Professor, Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology; Anne and Bernard Gray Family Chair in Cancer; Chief Medical Officer, Winship Cancer Institute, Emory University School of Medicine.
Dr Albert Icksang Ko : Professor, Epidemiology and Medicine, Chair, Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases, Yale School of Public Health
Dr Christina Ramirez : Professor of Biostatistics, UCLA Fielding School of Public Health
Dr Carlo Brugnara : Editor in Chief, American Journal of Hematology
Dr Michael Picard : Editor in Chief, Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography
Dr Jeff Drazen : Professor of Medicine, Harvard
Dr Monica Bertagnolli : Chair, Board of Directors, American Society of Clinical Oncology; Group Chair, Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology
Dr Yann Le Cun : Professor of Computer Science and Data Science, NYU; Chief AI Scientist, Facebook; Turing Laureate 2019
Dr Edith Mitchell : Past President, National Medical Association; Professor, Thomas Jefferson University
Dr Corey Cutler : Medical Director, Stem Cell Transplantation, Harvard Medical School
Dr De Kai : Professor, Computer Science and Engineering, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology; Distinguished Research Scholar, Berkeley; Founding Fellow, Association for Computational Linguistics
Dr Charles Ericsson : Professor and Head of Infectious Diseases, McGovern Medical School, University of Texas
Dr Ann Prestipin : Senior Vice President, COVID response, Massachusetts General Hospital
Dr Noopur Raje : Professor, Harvard Medical School; Director Center for Multiple Myeloma, Chair in Oncology, Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center
Dr Navneet Majhail : Immediate Past-President, American Society for Transplantation and Cellular Therapy
Dr Christopher Manning : Professor of Linguistics and Computer Science, Stanford
Dr Ruvandhi Nathavitharana : Vice Chair, TB Proof; Associate Professor, Division of Infectious Diseases Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Harvard Medical School
Dr Edward Nardell : Professor, Harvard Medical School
Dr Gregg Gonsalves: Assistant Professor, Epidemiology, Yale; Co-Director, Global Health Justice Partnership; Co-Director, Collaboration for Research Integrity and Transparency
Dr David McAdams : Professor, Business Administration (Fuqua School of Business) and Economics, Duke University
Dr. Walt de Heer , Regent's Professor of Physics, Georgia Institute of Technology
Dr Lin Chen : Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School;, Director of Travel Medicine Center, Mount Auburn Hospital
Dr Marc Suchard : Professor of Human Genetics, Biostatistics and Biomathematics, UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine
Marietje Schaake : International Director of Policy, Cyber Policy Center, Stanford; Member of the European Parliament (MEP) 2009-2019
Dr Michael Joyner : Anesthesiologist and Lead Investigator, Convalescent Plasma Program for COVID
Dr Jagmeet Singh : Professor, Harvard Medical School
Dr James Armitage : Professor of Medicine, University of Nebraska Medical Center
Dr Eric Westman : Professor, Duke University Medical Center, Past President, Obesity Medicine Association
Dr Chadi Nabhan : Professor, Department of Clinical Pharmacy and Outcomes Sciences, University of South Carolina; Chairman, Caris Precision Oncology Alliance
Dr Ik-Kyung Jang : Professor of Medicine, Harvard
Dr Anas Younes : Professor of Medicine, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Dr James Januzzi : Professor of Medicine, Harvard; Professor, Cardiology, Massachusetts General Hospital
Dr Vikas Sukhatme : Dean, Emory School of Medicine; Chief Academic Officer, Emory Healthcare
Dr Barbara Murray : Past President, Infectious Diseases Society of America; Professor of Medicine, University of Texas
Dr Michael Lin : Associate Professor, Neurobiology and Bioengineering, Stanford; Member of Scientists to Stop Covid-19
Dr Priya Sampathkumar Infection Control and Infectious Disease Specialist
Dr Mike Thompson : Director, Early Phase Cancer Research, Aurora Health Care
Dr David Shlim : Past President, International Society of Travel Medicine; Medical Director, Jackson Hole Travel and Tropical Medicine
Dr Daniel Morgan : Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health and Medicine, University of Maryland
Dr Lee Ellis : Professor of Surgery, Molecular and Cellular Oncology
Dr Dawd Siraj : Professor, Infectious Diseases, University of Wisconsin Madison
Dr Michael Sauri : Clinical Professor, Occupational Medicine, Johns Hopkins and USUHS Bethesda
Dr Amy Tan : Associate Professor, Medicine, University of Calgary
Dr Ross Levine : Professor, Economic Analysis and Policy, UC Berkeley
Dr Netanya Utay : Assistant Professor, Medicine, University of Texas
Dr Avinash Sinha : Assistant Professor, Anesthesia, McGill University
Dr Chip Lavie : Editor in Chief, Progress Cardiovascular Diseases; Professor and Medical Director, John Ochsner Heart and Vascular Institute
Dr Lin Chen : Associate Professor, Medicine, Harvard
Dr Katrina Armstrong : Physician in Chief, Massachusetts General Hospital
Dr Carlos del Rio : Professor of Medicine, Global Health & Epidemiology, Emory University
Dr Jordan Lake : Associate Professor, Infectious Diseases, University of Texas
Anna Kaltenboeck : Program Director, Center for Health Policy and Outcomes, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Dr Krishna Komanduri : Chair, Stem Cell Transplantation, Professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology, University of Miami
Dr Mark Harrington : Executive Director, Treatment Action Group
Dr Vishal Sikka : CEO, Vianai Systems. Board of Directors, Oracle and BMW; Former CEO, Infosys
Dr Joe Vipond : Clinical Assistant Professor, Emergency Medicine, University of Calgary
Dr Jason Abaluck: Associate Professor of Economics, Yale School of Management
Dr Miguel Perales : Chief, Adult Bone Marrow Transplantation Service, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Dr Judith Chevalier : Professor, Economics and Finance, Yale University
Dr Lawrence Greenblatt : Professor, Department of Community and Family Medicine, Duke University
Dr Adriaan Bax : Member, National Academy of Sciences
Dr Zeynep Tufekci : Associate Professor, Information and Library Science, UNC; Adjunct Professor, Department of Sociology; Writer: The Atlantic and The New York Times
European Signatories
Dr Richard Horton : Editor in Chief, The Lancet; Honorary Professor, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, University College London, and University of Oslo.
Dr Magdalena Skipper : Editor in Chief, Nature
Dr Martin McKee CBE : Past President, European Public Health Association; Professor, Public Health, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine; Director, European Observatory
Dr Trish Greenhalgh OBE : Professor, co-Director of Interdisciplinary Research In Health Sciences, Primary Health Care Sciences, University of Oxford
Dr Meletios-Athanasios Dimopoulos : Rector, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens
Dr Jesus San-Miguel : Director, Clinical & Translational Medicine, Universidad de Navarra
Dr Vladimir Zdimal : Head of Department of Aerosols Chemistry and Physics; Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals of the Czech Academy of Science
Dr Charles Tannock MBE : Member of the European Parliament (MEP) 1999-2019; NHS Consultant
Dr Keertan Dheda : Professor, Infectious and Tropical Diseases, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine; Director, Centre for Lung Infection and Immunity; Head: Division of Pulmonology, University of Cape Town; Professor of Medicine, Groote Schuur Hospital.
Dr KK Cheng , Director, Institute of Applied Health Research, University of Birmingham
Dr Mario Boccadoro : Director, Hematology, University of Torino
Dr Adrian Alegre : Head Hematology Department, Universitary Hospital La Princesa
Dr David Wraith : Director, Institute of Immunology and Immunotherapy, University of Birmingham
Dr Anna Sureda : Head, Clinical Hematology Department, Catalan Institute of Oncology; President, Spanish Group for stem Cell Transplantation and Cellular therapy
Dr Miguel Sanz : Researcher Emeritus, Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria La Fe; Honorary Professor, Medicine, University of Valencia
Dr Carlos Solano : Professor of Medicine, University of Valencia; Director, HSCT and Immune Therapy program, Hospital Clinico Universitario
Dr Jürgen Kuball : Chair, Department of Hematology, UMC Utrecht
Dr Catherine Cordonnier : Professor and Head of Haematology, Henri Mondor University Hospital
Dr Javier Zulueta : Director, Pulmonary Medicine, Clinica Universidad de Navarra
Dr Anna Rotkirch : Research Professor, Population Research Institute, Family Federation of Finland
Dr Key Pousttchi : Professor and past chair, Business Informatics and Digitalization, University of Potsdam
Dr Chris Papadopoulos : Public Health Director, University of Bedfordshire
Alexey Morgunov : CEO, Manifold Research; Lecturer, University of Cambridge
Dr Christophe Rapp : President, French Society of Travel Medicine
Dr Helene-Mari van der Westhuizen : Oxford University; Co-founder TB Proof
Dr Frederik Questier , Professor, Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Dr Lucica Ditiu : Executive Director, Stop TB Partnership
African Signatories
Dr Anneke Hesseling , Professor, Dept Pediatrics and Child Health, Stellenbosch University; Director of the Desmond Tutu TB Centre
Dr Rodney Ehrlich : Emeritus Professor, Senior Research Scholar, School of Public Health and Family Medicine, University of Cape Town
Dr Shaheen Mehtar , (retired) Professor, University of Stellenbosch, Chair of Infection Control Africa Network (ICAN)
Dr Angela Dramowski : Professor, Pediatric Infectious Diseases, Department of Pediatrics and Child Health, Stellenbosch University
Dr Gavin Churchyard : CEO, The Aurum Institute; Honorary Professor, University of Witwatersrand; Honorary Professor, London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine
Dr Arne von Delft : University of Cape Town; Co-founder of TB Proof
South American Signatories
Dr Guillermo Ruiz-Arguelles : Director General, Centro de Hematologia y Medicina Interna de Puebla
Dr Luis Lamb : Professor, Computer Science and AI, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul; Secretary of State for Innovation, Science and Technology
Asian Signatories
Dr Lalit Kumar : Professor and Head of Medical Oncology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences
Dr Lei-Han Tang , Professor, Director, Institute of Computational and Theoretical Studies, Hong Kong Baptist University
Dr Chi Chiu Leung : Editor-in-Chief, International Journal of Tuberculosis and Lung Disease; Chairman, Advisory Committee on Communicable Diseases, Hong Kong Medical Association
Dr Mammen Chandy : Director, Tata Medical Center
Dr Tai Hing Lam : Chair Professor, Community Medicine, Professor in Public Health, University of Hong Kong
Dr Mushfiq Mobarak : Scientific Director, Innovations for Poverty Action, Bangladesh; Professor of Economics, Yale
Dr Zhiyuan Li : Professor, Center for Quantitative Biology, Peking University
Dr Hisao Hayakawa : Professor, Theoretical Physics, Kyoto University
Oceania Signatories
Dr James Brown : Professor of Statistics, University of Technology Sydney
Dr Anthony Sunjaya : Scientia Doctoral Researcher, George Institute for Global Health, UNSW Sydney
Dr Ben Marais : Associate Professor Paediatrics & Child Health, University of Sydney
Dr Bart Willems : Co-founder, TB Proof; Public Health Medicine Specialist, Nga Tai Ora, Public Health Northland
