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I hear that people are not get used to wearing face masks in spite of the fear against pandemic swine flue these days. How things in Japan? At a moment there’s not a single nation reported infected with the flu over here, but as we are having a long national holiday season (called Golden Week, from 29 Apri. to 10 May, as for 2009. This includes Saturday & Sunday, and if we take a couple of days off in between this period, we can have as long as about 2-week holiday) we are most likely to travel abroad and there’s high possibilities Japanese tourists bring the virus back home. I’m very much scared of that.

Anyhow, we are in the culture that we wear medical masks or face masks with no hesitation at any time. So it’s quite common for Japanese people to buy wear face masks whether bird flu or swine flue are threatening us or not. We wear face masks every winter to avoid flu virus as well as not to give the cold to other people. Every spring comes people also wear them to avoid pollen because many people have pollen allergy. Hence it’s not too much to say that I see no drug store or even no convenience store like 7-eleven that does not have face masks at any time. In other words, face masks are always at hand in Japan.

So basically most of Japanese people like wearing face masks, (I personally don’t because of being uncomfortable with humid air around my face as well as hard-breathing feelings all the time!) once swine flu is reported, the stock price of pharmaceutical companies that manufacture face masks skyrocketed from the very bottom and people rush to buy face masks to stock for themselves in preparation for the day. As long as I search among the web, MORSE GUARD, unwoven fabric mask with 4 filters is most protective and effective against avian flu or swine flu, which of course is great against ordinary flu, pollen, and dust. The mask is invented by Dr. Ronald A. Morse, who used to work for the U.S Department of Defense. N95 masks are better? In fact our government recommend unwoven fabric masks rather than N95, because N95 is way too protective to breathe. It’s also said that N95 needs skills of wearing. That means if we wear it incorrect way, the performance goes down.

Well, how the things in your country? Are you, your family or friends doing good? I just hope vaccine gets ready asap and help people to soothe the panic.

Meanwhile, the face mask “MORSE GUARD” is available from here. (This is a biggest online mall in Japan, and you can buy the products from Japan by following their guidelines and instructions. Please also check this page first for how to shop and more.)

I’ve added TwitThis plugin so that you can find TwitThis button at the bottom of each post & page I’ve updated. If you have an account with Twitter and find any interesting posts or pages at my site, please feel free to tweet them as you like. When you hit the button, you will be asked to enter your account info. which is exactly the same as your Twitter’s one. I’m not a frequent user of Twitter, but I do once in a while. It gives me another chance of communication between those who follow me. You can follow me from here or also from the icon at the right top area of sidebar in this blog.

That’s all. :p
It’s just a small change, only a small button, though…