The Los Angeles Times is reporting potential COVID-19 infection risk at California beaches, not just from other people out for walks and surfing, but from the ocean and its spray.
The piece quotes Kim Prather, an atmospheric chemist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, who “worries SARS-CoV-2 could enter the ocean from sewage spills and outfalls, and then reenter the atmosphere.” Prather’s concern about beach exposure to the virus, about which scientists are still learning, is not just about swimming in potentially polluted ocean waters, but the particulates and “microscopic pathogens” that could wash into the ocean from rains and be delivered by spray from waves carried on the wind.
She also says, “I wouldn’t go in the water if you paid me $1 million right now.”
Another scientist, Charles Gerba of the University of Arizona, who’s been studying viruses in wastewater, says it’s unclear how long COVID-19 can survive in saltwater.
Humboldt local Jennifer Savage, Surfrider’s policy manager for California, is also quoted, in the piece, in support of beach closures around the state for the sake of public health, though those changes have been driven by concern over maintaining social distance. While Redwood State and National Parks have closed their parking lots, beaches in Humboldt County remain open with some restrictions for parking.
This article appears in DIY Community Face Mask Template.
Okay then we’re all dead already! This is the most non-science Ive read yet. Did you actually read this person’s concerns? The sea is churning with deadly everything that gets aerosolized and sent around the world in weeks, well beach or no beach then we should all be dead already.
Interesting no beaches were shut when a radioactive plume from Fukushima showed up on our coast. and if the argument is that this virus is so much more deadly then again if it is that deadly were already dead. Absurd the crap being reported the reactions to this are straight out of a Kafka tale. What a bunch of thoughtless drones. There is a difference between Fact and Truth, Fact: The Sun is going to expand to engulf the Earth it will evaporate all water, blow away all atmosphere, sear all life on Earth and then disintegrate the entire Planet consuming it into its mass. Truth: Not tomorrow! There is all kinds of stuff in the sea and in water we have evolved with most of it it get aerosolized but it has been doing that for eons creating the environment we evolved into, some of the stuff is pathogenic but the likelihood of any of us actually getting it is so very remote it nearly like winning a 2 billion dollar lottery, not impossible but definitely not a risk to be concerned about-if we are going to be concerned by what is in this article then we would have be far more worried about the other stuff that is not COVID-19 the beaches and waterways should be off grounds always, and why should we stop there if its aerosolized we should not allow habitation within what 2?3?4?10 miles of the shore? Actually as it can pass around the world Everyone should stay in and all shelters should have hepa-filters, and we should just wait in our hovels to die, that means all of us the police, healthcare workers, and politicians must not be exceptions! We should be terrified because the Sun will engulf the Earth!
Really based on stupid non factual fiction.!! Congrats