key: cord-1036706-6p0tt078
authors: Gupta, Deepak
title: Living With In-Mask Micro-Climate
date: 2020-06-19
journal: Med Hypotheses
DOI: 10.1016/j.mehy.2020.110010
sha: da2977955fdfed386cad9bf56a73acda5993ddde
doc_id: 1036706
cord_uid: 6p0tt078

The in-mask micro-climate is heat and moisture buildup under facemasks but facemask doffing can immediately neutralize in-mask elevations in temperature and relative humidity. Therefore, home/workplace/facility living with in-mask micro-climate during COVID-19 pandemic warrants safe provisions for intermittent facemask “vacation”.

The in-mask micro-climate is heat and moisture buildup under facemasks as demonstrated with standard N95 respirator [1] . Analogously, Figure- "vacation" may be warranted during COVID-19 pandemic without losing facemasks' potential preventative role and investigational "therapeutic" role [2] [3] [4] . However, clean-clear-silent(quiet) social-distancing zones will be required for safe facemask doffing considering that facemask "vacation" may not be ignored if following hypotheses are validated: (a) brain may not dissipate heat effectively in-mask [5] ; (b) increased work of breathing in-mask may increase calorie needs to avoid catabolism [6] ; (c) airways' cells evolved to thrive under lower temperatures may grow erratically if chronically exposed to elevated in-mask temperature accentuated by elevated inmask relative humidity [7] [8] . Essentially, living with in-mask micro-climate warrants intermittent facemask "vacation" provisions. 

The author declares to have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper. 

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