If you are putting on a face mask outside a hospital setting hoping to stave off a Nipah virus attack, you are probably overdoing it.
For, the virus’s capacity to go out to the public space and attack humans is limited. Compared to other major viruses such as those causing Ebola, measles and swine flu, Nipah's resources to transmit to humans are rather poor.
In Kerala’s scenario, the possibility of the virus transmission outside the hospital setting is dim, says G. Arunkumar, head of the Manipal Centre for Virus Research, who helped detect the virus in Kozhikode.
Why so? The Nipah virus transmits from the infected human to another only when the disease is at its peak. At this stage, the patient invariably is in a hospital bed and is immobile. This stage lasts 48 to 72 hours, before the patient dies, Dr. Arunkumar pointed out at a session with journalists at Kozhikode on Saturday.
And, the virus transmits from the patient’s bodily fluids, especially from the saliva droplets that come out through cough. Here again, if you are at least one metre away from patient, the chances are the virus cannot catch you, Dr. Arunkumar said.
So, in a realistic sense, the virus cannot jump out of an infected person and attack you on a bus or train or on the street—mainly because at the peak of the infection the patient can hardly move out of his hospital bed. This makes your putting on a face mask in public superfluous.
So, the virus usually targets the medical staff and other caregivers?
Absolutely true, Dr. Arunkumar agrees. You can get the infection from a hospital where a seriously-ill infected person is being cared for.
For instance, 17 of the 18 who got infected so far got the virus from the first patient — in the casualty and radiology departments of the Perambra taluk hospital and the Kozhikode Government Medical College Hospital.
Dr. Arunkumar urged the hospital staff to always wear face masks and gloves as well as take other prescribed precautionary measures to keep off the virus. But for the general public, face mask is not necessary.