Face masks and shopping

[Emma123L]

For me shopping on the high street now is a quite a depressing and anxiety ridden experience. You queue to get into the each shop for 10 minutes, then anti had had to be slathered on hands and it be has made my skin peel on my fingers, I was told loudly by shop staff to follow the arrows on the floor and not to touch the clothes unless absolutely neccessary. Supermarkets are nearly as bad. Now with many people (all from 24th July) wearing masks people nervously dart out of the way of you with fear in their eyes ...mainly middle aged or older people .you can't see the rest of their face behind the mask..Is this how we are supposed to live for the next year or two before a vaccine is found...if one is found? I must say that cafes and pubs are populated by less nervous people and are bit more relaxing to go to. I'm doing most of my shopping online now for everything and just one trip to the supermarket. I'm sure many people's mental health will be affected by this if these measures are in place for a year or two.

@Emma123L

Gamerchick Face masks DO NOT make you safer. They make you FEEL safer! The government needed to entice the fearful back onto the high street. Teachers do not have to wear a face mask, nor do people frequenting pubs , cafes or restaraunts.

They make everyone safer if everyone wears one. Teachers not wearing one is because the government can’t work out a way to make it acceptable/practical, not because teachers wouldn’t be safer wearing one. They don’t seem to really care whether teachers are safe or not, especially in secondary schools where everyone is back in I. September as before but with a bit more hand washing.

This is going to be the new normal for a while and we all just need to be adults and deal with it.

I have had to go to my surgery once a week during lockdown and have always worn a mask. I hate them because a) I'm claustrophobic, b) my glasses steam up and c) when other people wear them - I'm very hard of hearing and rely on lip reading and understand nothing said through a mask. BUT none of those things stop me wearing one or expecting others to wear one.

I've read so many whining posts on here with poor excuses as to why they should be exempt from wearing a mask. If you can't cope with wearing one then you will have to stay at home and order everything online. Moaning about it will achieve nothing.

Emma- you don't have to wear a mask in a cafe so you could just go there?

I'd be much happier if everybody in the shops wore face masks, followed one way routes and kept a couple of metres away from me. The only times I've got stressed is if I've picked a bad time and been to the supermarket when it was crowded and people haven't bothered watching where they are going.

Putting a bit of anti bac on my hands and wiping down the handle of the basket is far from anxiety inducing. I'm a teacher (I've been in school since the beginning of lockdown) and frequent handwashing and cleaning of surfaces has become the normal thing to do. It's just routine so we don't really think about it any more.

Are we supposed to live like this and be constantly anxious when we leave our front door?
@Emma123L the anxiety and the masks are two separate things. It isn’t the masks making people anxious, surely, but the fact there is a disease with no vaccine or cure doing the rounds?
How would not wearing a mask make you less anxious?

If you’re anxious and worried OP, then most places have online slots available now so that might be a good idea for you? Generally most people I know/see are just getting on with it - no darting about or worried about seeing others in masks - but understand anxiety might make you feel differently.

No, face masks don't make YOU safer. They make everyone else safer.

Wearing a mask, or seeing others wearing masks makes 0 impact on my (pretty fragile) mental health. I feel safer in shops where people wear masks and social distance so if anything that’s a positive.

Sanitising my hands was something I did fairly frequently anyway. I just use hand moisturiser more often now.

I haven’t seen anybody behaving weirdly or their eyes darting about because of wearing masks.

I'm thoroughly enjoying it. Lovely empty shops, far fewer people in the street, never had to queue for anything so far during lockdown (except twice, when I've arrived at a supermarket a few minutes before they opened)
Went to Primark and a few other shops this morning, and Superdrug and Selfridges yesterday (all in Oxford Street, which is a short walk from my home) and all were peaceful and a million times more pleasant than usual.
I always wear a mask anywhere inside, and I enjoy wearing them. I've got a nice collection of gorgeous ones with great designs

drspouse...They don't and most scientific advisors do not really know if masks make any difference ....
Anyway I'm doing my shopping online I just can't be bothered with shopping on the high street anymore but will still go to pubs and cafes.

Face masks DO NOT make you safer. They make you FEEL safer!

Yes they do. I'm much happier to go shopping now that they're mandatory in Scotland. I am safer. Do you know much about masks and filtration rates OP? I do because I work in an operating theatre and wear them all the time. We wear them in theatre for a reason, they protect our patients. If they didn't work why on earth would we be wearing them?

The funniest thing I see when driving is the face mask fanatics driving in their cars with their face masks on🙄

@Emma123L

The funniest thing I see when driving is the face mask fanatics driving in their cars with their face masks on🙄

Why?

Maybe they are going between shops and don't want to keep replacing masks or they are about to pick someone up?

They aren't affecting you anyway are they?

@Emma123L

The funniest thing I see when driving is the face mask fanatics driving in their cars with their face masks on🙄

Aaah. So you aren’t finding masks in shops anxiety inducing at all. That was a handy excuse for not wanting to wear one because you think you are too clever and exceptional to need one and everyone else is an idiot. Got you.

I'm in Scotland and there wasn't half as much moaning when they were made mandatory here. I wonder why we've had one death in the last week compared to hundreds in England.

Nobody is darting anywhere and nobody has fear in their eyes FFS.

@Emma123L
drspouse...They don't and most scientific advisors do not really know if masks make any difference ....

This is bullshit and a lie. The science behind masks preventing spread of COVID-19 has been accepted science for months now. The main UK government and some of UK media may have been waffling, umming and ahhing while doing jack shit but the rest of the world reported the scientific progress correctly and got on with their lives while reducing the spread of the virus.

Woman up and wear a freaking mask.

I would be delighted if the elderly and middle aged darted out of my way in shops. The ones I encounter mostly seem to be standing too close, walking in the opposite direction to the arrows, blocking aisles while they decide which item to take from a shelf of identical items, while wearing a face covering that is only over their mouth.

I don't know whether you would put me in the middle aged or elderly category (I'm 63), but I have been wearing a mask in shops since lockdown began. They not particularly comfortable but they are necessary for other peoples safety for as long as it takes!
I'm doing it for others and I want others to do it for me. And yes, I intend to be judgemental about anyone on MN who says they won't wear one because they don't like it or its depressing or uncomfortable.

I feel great sympathy for those unable to comply because of genuine health reasons (physical and mental) and seriously hope that the government can organise some sort of 'exemption badge', but for everyone else who just thinks they're a special case?
Stop taking the piss!

My supermarket was quite busy this afternoon and only one person wasn't wearing a mask (this is in Scotland). The staff in attendance were pleasant and jovial. Everyone was just doing their shopping in the normal way.

I'm beginning to feel odd because I don't feel all this anxiety that I read about on here. It's possible to be very careful without being a nervous wreck.

I sort of agree OP. I'm in Scotland and I much preferred shopping two weeks ago (pre-masks). Despite the one way systems and queuing there was generally a feeling of patience. More and more people started wearing masks - mainly older people and mainly women it has to be said and there was bizarre behaviour when wearing masks.

Now i find shopping even more horrific because of the masks - people no longer seem to respect SD and it is much more a free for all. Everyone seems more stressed and impolite as they just want to get to the doors and remove their masks. Sure lots of people will disagree with me but this is my experience. And I saw at least 10% of people with their noses out .... but it's not my place to police this and in a way I don't blame them. It seems any old scrappy bit of fabric, no matter how ill fitting will do

OP I know what you’re trying to say and this is why I haven’t been shopping yet (except food shopping) and I’m not likely to in the near future. I know jobs are at risk and we should be trying to use our high streets now, but I just don’t feel like it would be an experience. It all sounds pretty stressful so I’m going to stick to online shopping shopping for the time being.

Don't know what all the 'nervously darting eyes is'...… I wear a mask every time I shop and I'm happy and smiley in mine...it shows in the eyes too...

Today noticed an awful lot more masks in the supermarket, everyone perfectly happy, talking to each other (at a distance in the car park), a number of people had gloves on too (can be sanitised without making the hands chapped), everyone queuing without problem. Seemed almost normal, can't understand what all the angst and anxiety is about.

And yesterday, for the first time, I was at a Garden Centre and actually forgot I had my mask on! Shows that if you wear a mask enough, it becomes quite natural after a while....

@JingsMahBucket
The research / evidence is really flimsy - fabric can catch some droplets - but by far the most effective measure is 2m social distancing which has goneout the window where i live. Masks don't give me any sense of security

The funniest thing I see when driving is the face mask fanatics driving in their cars with their face masks on🙄

What like people delivering medicines direct from the pharmacy to people’s doors?

Uber, Private Ambulance and Taxi Drivers?

People transporting vulnerable or shielding members?

Members of the public that don’t want to keep touching and thus contaminating their masks when they have multiple stops to make?

Or people that just genuinely forgot they are wearing them?

Rather be a “face mask fanatic” than a selfish person who is too vain or childish to wear one to protect others (those with genuine health conditions exempt of course).

Aren't shop workers almost twice as likely to have died than the general population? If masks help keep them safe, I think I will put up with it

It's really not surprising that people are confused when the social norm has lately been to prioritise subjective feelings over objective reality.

Take the fact that male biology (maybe more ACE 2 receptors or absence of oestrogen) means that objectively the death rate for men is higher than that for women. Is that still the case for trans women who retain male hormone profile/biology or is their feeling that they are really women or dress as women determinant in relation to severity?

Politics does the subjective bullshit to prioritise the economy over health and safety.

The behaviour of a virus is purely objective. It does not give a shiny shit about feelings.

Mask wearing is about reducing transmission and viral load and thus reducing the need for total lockdown.

The virus is in the environment. It can spread through asymptomatic or presymptomatic hosts. Either we lockdown until it's not, or until a vaccine guarantees herd immunity or we adopt measures such as mask wearing.

It's a balancing act - not increasing mortality and morbidity, not screwing the economy and not screwing the health service. They are all interdependent.