What happens when we cough and how far do coughs travel? With the help of the so-called Schlierenspiegel, researchers at Bauhaus University make visible what is normally hidden from the human eye. In the video, the man can be seen coughing in six ways – normal breathing, coughing, coughing into hand, coughing into sleeve, coughing into a dust mask and coughing into a medical mask.
You can see the silhouette of a man who breathes normally and finally begins to cough heavily.First without protective measures, then with your hand held in front of you, in the crook of your arm and with various breathing masks.”Especially when coughing without protection from the mouth, it becomes clear how much the air we breathe spreads through the room,” explains Prof. Conrad Völker, head of the Chair of Building Physics. For this reason, the mouth must be covered when coughing, the experiment shows.”Ideally with the crook of the arm, also to keep the hands clean and not to carry possible viruses or other pathogens through body contact or surfaces,” adds Prof. Völker. Even the use of respiratory masks shows an improvement, but here, too, there is no one hundred percent protection against a droplet infection.
This video is an impressive illustration of why we should comply with the World Health Organization’s recommendations on behavior against coronavirus.
So please…cover your mouth when you cough!
