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It doesn’t really, not unless there is something very wrong with the mask, or the wearer has an underlying condition. Technically, “hypercapnia” means any detectable increase in blood CO2 concentration. Realistically, we can measure very, very small increases—at levels far too small to affect the body.
Why does it happen?
Every mask traps a small amount of air between it and the face.
Pakistan saw another record day in terms of adding new coronavirus cases to the tally as a total of 1,315 cases – highest since the emergence of COVID-19 in the country during late February — were reported from all provinces and AJK and GB.
Increase is mainly attributed to higher number of testing in Punjab, as the province crossed threshold of 5,000 daily tests for the first time. Punjab reported a total of 579 cases in the province during past 24 hours.
A total of 9,857 tests were conducted in last 24 hours, with more than half of tests done in Punjab only.
Hospitalizations rose sharply to 4,405, up from 3,839 a day earlier. Of those in hospitals, 143 patients are in critical condition — while another 43 patients are on ventilator.
Confirmed Cases | In 24 Hours | Tests in 24 Hours | Deaths | Last 24 Hours | |
AJK | 71 | 00 | 54 | 00 | 00 |
Balochistan | 1,321 | 103 | 271 | 21 | 02 |
GB | 372 | 08 | 142 | 03 | 00 |
Islamabad | 464 | 49 | 993 | 04 | 00 |
KP | 3,288 | 159 | 783 | 185 | 05 |
Punjab | 8,103 | 579 | 5,043 | 136 | 12 |
Sindh | 7,882 | 417 | 2,571 | 137 | 07 |
Total | 21,501 | 1,315 | 9,857 | 486 | 24 |
Contact tracing, a core disease control measure employed by local and state health department personnel for decades, is a key strategy for preventing further spread of COVID-19. Immediate action is needed. Communities must scale up and train a large contact tracer workforce and work collaboratively across public and private agencies to stop the transmission of COVID-19.
Contact tracing is a specialized skill. To be done effectively, it requires people with the training, supervision, and access to social and medical support for patients and contacts. Requisite knowledge and skills for contact tracers include, but are not limited to:
Given the magnitude of COVID-19 cases and plans to eventually relax mitigation efforts such as stay at home orders and social distancing, communities need a large number of trained contact tracers. These contact tracers need to quickly locate and talk with the patients, assist in arranging for patients to isolate themselves, and work with patients to identify people with whom the patients have been in close contact so the contact tracer can locate them. The actual number of staff needed is large and varies depending on a number of factors including but not limited to:
The time to start building the trained workforce is now.
Identifying contacts and ensuring they do not interact with others is critical to protect communities from further spread. If communities are unable to effectively isolate patients and ensure contacts can separate themselves from others, rapid community spread of COVID-19 is likely to increase to the point that strict mitigation strategies will again be needed to contain the virus.
Contact tracers need to:
Based on our current knowledge, a close contact is someone who was within 6 feet of an infected person for at least 15 minutes starting from 48 hours before illness onset until the time the patient is isolated. They should stay home, maintain social distancing, and self-monitor until 14 days from the last date of exposure.
Contact investigation of patients with COVID-19 potentially exposed at work and patients in health care facilities, congregate living settings or housing with many people is complex. Appropriate engagement with infection control and occupational health programs is recommended. Priority settings include:
In addition to health care workers, it is important to assess interactions between residents and all staff, including but not limited to activity coordinators, food service staff, and sanitation management. Transitional case management plans should be put in place for patients in isolation and contacts who are separated for monitoring. Management plans should also be created for transitioning from one setting to another, such as transitions from hospitals to acute or long-term care facilities or home isolation, or from prison and jail to parole and probation.
Separating contacts from people who are not exposed is critical to the success of any contact tracing effort and requires social supports for individual compliance and medical monitoring. First and foremost is the assessment of an individual’s ability to in stay home and maintain social distance from others, a safe environment that provides the necessary supports (private room and bathroom, adequate food and water, and access to medication) and the ability to practice adequate infection control. For a portion of the U.S. population this will be a challenge, particularly for some of the most vulnerable populations.
Support services for consideration include but may not be limited to housing, food, medicine, and economic supports. For contacts without a primary care provider, linkage to clinical care may be needed. Support for medical monitoring includes patient care packages (e.g., thermometers, sanitizers, mask, gloves) and technological supports for medical monitoring (e.g., mobile phone apps). If possible, contacts should be asked to voluntarily stay home, monitor themselves, and maintain social distancing from others. However, health departments have the authority to issue legal orders of quarantine, should the situation warrant that measure.
Engagement of the public with contact tracers must be widely accepted in order to protect friends, family, and community members from future potential infections. Key public officials and community leaders will need to be engaged and supportive of contact tracing efforts. Consider reaching out to community leaders as part of the neighborhood-level contact tracing team. To be successful, a community will need public awareness, and understanding and acceptance of contact tracing and the need for contacts to separate themselves from others who are not exposed. Community members need to take responsibility to follow the guidance from public health agencies.
Case investigation, contact tracing, and contact follow-up and monitoring will need to be linked with timely testing, clinical services, and agile data management systems to facilitate real-time electronic transmission of laboratory and case data for public health action. Technology partners are key in the modification of existing systems and the development of new user-friendly data interfaces to manage multiple data streams with seamless interoperability. Case management tools can help automate key pieces of the contact tracing process, making the overall process more efficient. Ideally, data systems would also include automated reports to aid in monitoring progress and outcomes of contact tracing. Data sharing agreements between local, tribal and state, and federal jurisdictions need to be established or augmented to ensure timely and accurate data collection and sharing.
The adoption of emerging technologies that can assist private and public health practitioners with client communication, medical monitoring, and strategies to amplify contact tracing may greatly help with scaling up contact tracing as needed. Digital Contact Tracing Tools for COVID-19 pdf icon[1 page]
Public health agencies and their partners will need to monitor some key components of their programs to improve performance as needed. Potential metrics routinely reviewed could include the following process and outcome measures: