Ashamed to take your mask off while you eat? Then this great new product is for you.
When we first saw this story about the “kosk” or “nose mask”, your Back Page correspondent thought it was too silly even for us.
But we wouldn’t be a true chronicle of tangentially medically relevant tomfoolery if we ignored it.
The inverse of everyone’s favourite tokenistic mask-wearing effort, in which the mask rests loosely under the nose, the kosk starting hitting Korean and then international headlines late last week. And people started face-palming.
‘Are they also selling teapots made from chocolate?’https://t.co/qI4buNiYTw
— JOE (@JOE_co_uk) February 4, 2022
The point of the nose mask is evidently for wearers to appear to be doing the right thing when eating out, even at the expense of enjoying the aromas of their meal.
The point is clearly not to protect the wearer from covid, if you consider that the most commonly depicted kosk works by folding up the lower mouth-covering part so it sits against your nose – conveniently delivering any SARS-CoV-2 particles it has trapped there directly into your upper airways.
An alternative version has a separate, detachable mouth section to remove. For those of who are even now, in Pandemic Year 3, struggling with one set of ear loops – pity the spectacle-wearers – this sounds like another fresh hell.
Epidemiologist Professor Catherine Bennett of Deakin University generously called the kosk “better than nothing”, but pointed out the protection would be marginal as the wearer was unlikely to breathe exclusively through their nose.
If you’re surprised it’s taken two years to fill this much-needed gap in the market, consider that British TV presenter Ross Kemp was well out in front, sporting the mouth-hole mask back in June 2020.
And come to think of it, this bizarre series of iStock photos was taken in March of that year.
The BP can’t see the kosk taking off in Australia. In a culture where boorish defiance is more the norm, it’s hard to imagine social correctness being so prized – and here we do have to give the Koreans credit.
If you see something as useful as a chocolate teapot, let felicity@medicalrepublic.com.au know about it
