The Evolving Science of Face Masks and COVID-19

Since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began recommending that members of the public mask up last spring, additional research has backed the use of face masks to combat the coronavirus. While knowledge gaps still remain, experts agree that masks should be used — and increasingly, they are emphasizing the use of better masks.

In our last deep dive into the research on masks in April 2020, we explained that there were some lab studies that supported the idea that masks would be effective against the coronavirus, or SARS-CoV-2....