By NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — The habits that Reno County Health Department Director Nick Baldetti would like people to keep once COVID-19 is not an immediate threat are simple.
"It's nothing new," Baldetti said. "The awareness and persistence of best hygiene practices and washing your hands and upper respiratory etiquette, especially in the fall and winter months, are probably the practices that we'd like to bring back to the forefront as best practices, because it's the same things that we advocate for in terms of influenza."
Getting the politics out of mask wearing isn't something Baldetti has an answer to.
"I think we simply have to have leadership in this country stop weaponizing the aspect of best practices for health," Baldetti said. "Unfortunately, I think, I don't expect that to go away anytime soon."
Mask wearing is still a good practice, in Baldetti's opinion.
"The science shows us that mask use significantly lowers the spread of the aerosolization of the viral body," Baldetti said. "Because the virus itself travels through the upper respiratory pathways, which presents in terms of the microdroplets that are expressed every time you and I talk, sneeze, breathe, etc."
Baldetti acknowledges that because it is an election year, the politicization of whether or not to wear masks likely isn't something that can change back at this point.