- Most coronavirus infections occur when someone is less than a meter away from someone with COVID-19.
- Internal meetings, even when people are socially distant, remain risky because the drops remain in the air longer when there is insufficient ventilation.
- The vaccination effort in the U.S. needs to increase to combat the spread of a more contagious and resilient COVID strain in South Africa.
Much of what we know, or thought we knew, about the coronavirus has changed in the past few months. Of course, that was to be expected, since health experts and researchers were initially baffled by how the coronavirus manifested itself in patients and how it managed to spread so quickly.
Now that we have been in the pandemic for almost a year, health experts have a much firmer view of how the coronavirus spreads and, in turn, what can be done to reduce the likelihood of transmission. Suffice to say that continually washing your countertops and disinfecting your home, while important, does not address how most people probably came into contact with COVID-19.
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According to the CDC, COVID-19 spreads more readily when a positive COVID-19 person is close to another person. And, seeing how transmission normally occurs through respiratory droplets, common activities such as laughing, talking or even breathing heavily can increase the likelihood of transmission. In fact, heavy breathing is exactly the reason why an activity like going to the gym can be especially risky.
The CDC below details how COVID-19 typically spreads between two people:
- People who are physically close (less than 6 feet) to a person with COVID-19 or who have direct contact with that person are at increased risk of infection.
- When people with COVID-19 cough, sneeze, sing, speak or breathe, they produce respiratory droplets. These droplets can vary in size, from larger droplets (some of which are visible) to smaller droplets. Small droplets can also form particles when they dry very quickly in the air stream.
- Infections occur mainly through exposure to respiratory droplets when a person is in close contact with someone who has COVID-19.
- Respiratory droplets cause infection when they are inhaled or deposited on mucous membranes, such as those that line the inside of the nose and mouth.
- As the respiratory droplets move away from the person with COVID-19, the concentration of these droplets decreases. Larger drops fall from the air due to gravity. Droplets and smaller particles spread in the air.
By the way, one of the reasons why a COVID-19 infection is more likely in the winter is because the droplets tend to stay in the air longer in environments with cooler, drier air.
The CDC adds that COVID-19 airborne transmission is a transmission risk, even when people adhere to the social distance guidelines. Although less common than direct person-to-person transmission, the CDC writes that these transmissions usually take place in closed spaces with poor ventilation.
Under these circumstances, scientists believe that the amount of droplets and smaller infectious particles produced by people with COVID-19 were concentrated enough to spread the virus to others. The infected people were in the same space during the same period or shortly after the person with COVID-19 left.
In fact, this is why internal meetings are especially risky, even if people remain socially distant. To date, the United States has recorded 26.4 million coronavirus infections and 446,643 COVID-related deaths.
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A longtime Mac user and Apple enthusiast, Yoni Heisler has been writing about Apple and the technology industry in general for over 6 years. His writings were published in Edible Apple, Network World, MacLife, Macworld UK and, more recently, TUAW. When not writing and analyzing the latest developments with Apple, Yoni enjoys watching Improv shows in Chicago, playing football and cultivating new addictions to TV shows, the most recent examples being The Walking Dead and Broad City.