Sometimes people ask how it is possible that so many doctors and health care professionals do not understand Valley Fever, or how so much outdated information is common in the study of this disease.
An MIT researcher says gaseous clouds could carry droplets of all sizes up to 27 feet, though doctors contend 6 feet is adequate against coronavirus.
Source: Coronavirus germs can travel up to 27 feet, MIT researcher says
The COVID-19 pandemic proves that it’s not just a Valley Fever problem. The need for better quality information is everywhere. Conflicting numbers have been released about how social distancing can work during the coronavirus outbreak and what is an acceptable distance.
MIT Associate Professor Lydia Bourouiba’s work at The Fluid Dynamics of Disease Transmission Laboratory showed infectious particles could travel up to 27 feet. She believed WHO and CDC guidelines needed to be changed in light of her laboratory findings since current guidelines focus on the largest droplets, while the better metaphor for what happens with viral spread would be a fast-moving gaseous cloud of infectious material, and that even the large droplets could travel within such a cloud.
Shortly after Bourouiba’s work was published recent CDC guidance noted the risk of COVID-19 at 13 feet of spread, which is still more than twice current social distancing recommendations. Whatever the number, it is important to show that there can be disagreements in medical methodology, that the first stated numbers are often wrong (remember when it was just six feet?), and that it takes time for authorities to catch up with the data. Sometimes it has been difficult for people to believe that so much of the Valley Fever epidemic has been ignored and been treated so improperly for so long. The worldwide coronavirus epidemic proves that this isn’t an anomaly – This problem is everywhere. The battle for accurate, high-quality information is universal and desperately needed, whether for Valley Fever, coronavirus, and perhaps many other diseases the average person has never even considered.