Global fight against novel coronavirus: Clearing up misconceptions

Misconception four: Healthy people do not need to wear masks

There are three crucial parts in the fight against the coronavirus and pandemic: prevention, control and treatment.

Prevention is an effective self-protective measure healthy people should take due to the virus' transmission mode, including wearing masks and washing hands.

Control is detecting infected people and taking measures like putting them in quarantine. It includes various testing measurements, home isolation, temporary group isolation, and being put into infection wards in hospitals.

Treatment is the curing behavior doctors in hospitals take in accordance with patients' disease situations including medicine, psychological treatments and supplementary medical appliances.

Why should people wear masks? First, to prevent healthy people from being infected. When two people have close contact, if the healthy person is wearing a mask with a melt-blown layer which can block droplets of the other person entering directly into their mouth or nose, there will be less chance of being infected.

Second, it is to control patients transmitting the virus. Masks with melt-blown layers can effectively stop patients' droplets spreading when they talk and infecting other healthy people, so patients should wear masks.

Therefore, each country ought to have an open attitude towards this rather than be stubborn. Methods should be adopted and strengthened as soon as possible, as long as they are good for prevention and control.

Misconception five: Overall epidemic prevention vs. Herd immunity

Prevention and control is meant to infection sources, protect healthy people and decrease the number of infectious people. Treatment is curing diseases and saving people's lives, and decreasing fatalities.

Thus it can be seen that testing and curing after receiving is not only beneficial to controlling infection sources, but also good for decreasing fatalities by preventing patients from declining into severe cases.

Herd immunity only partially stresses treatment while ignoring prevention and control. It puts the incidental before the fundamental.

Although situations in each country or region are different, it is suggested each country's government and people respect science, make policies as early as possible and cooperate globally.

The author is president of Fuhai Group Co Ltd. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

（The article is translated by Guan Xiaomeng, Wang Shuqing and Sun Ru.）