BOSTON (WBZ NewsRadio) — A recent test from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that all of the KN95 masks they looked at fell below the FDA's 95 percent filtration efficiency standard.
A portion of the masks brought over from China by the Patriots plane last month were KN95 masks, as opposed to the FDA-approved N95 respirators.
The Department of Public Health says the different countries have different standards for filtering facepiece respirators. The Chinese government regulates the KN95 respirators. They said that there is a shortage of approved N95 masks in the U.S., and if "you do not have access to N95 respirators, then you can consider using a KN95 mask as an alternative."
However, based on test results, the KN95 cannot protect an individual performing an aerosol generating procedure on someone with COVID-19 such as intubations and CPR, the state says. However, they can be used in a hospital setting.
The health department says that for a KN95 mask to provide appropriate protection it "must form a seal with the wearer's face, so that air passed through the filter (instead of around the edges) before it is inhaled."
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