Make An Informed Decision When You Buy Anti Pollution Mask

Posted by yashi ganguly on June 29th, 2018

Many people think if they buy the anti-pollution mask they would have done enough to deal with the pollution. That is a wrong notion. The market is full of anti-pollution products. They can confuse you and lead to a wrong decision. You might end up spending your hard-earned money on a product which is at best a poor cousin of a real one. Since fighting pollution is a big industry now, thanks to the rising pollution levels in several Indian cities, people are out to make a fast buck. This especially true in the winter season when several companies compete to sell you the anti-pollution masks. Most of them do not even qualified to as anti-pollution mask they are poor imitations.

They look like one but do not provide any protection. The reason: they are not certified! Any serious company when it sets its foot in the market, first makes sure that the product it is launching is certified and worth the purpose. The fly-by-night operators give a damn. Here the example of China is worth noting, when smog engulfed the Beijing city, people were concerned. They were looking for the option. The companies doled out surgical masks which were no protection for the high PM 2.5 level in Beijing at that time. They not only wasted their money but also risked their health.

To understand the certification for anti-pollution mask we must understand what the main constituents of the pollution are and which one is most dangerous. There are six constituents of pollution which you would find in a big city: Carbon monoxide, lead, nitrogen dioxide, ozone, particles and sulfur dioxide. While all these are rather familiar terms only Particle is less understood one though it happens to be the most lethal of all. It is the number of suspended particles or particulate matter in the air.

Particles are classified based on their size, referred to as their 'aerodynamic diameter'. 'Coarse particles' are those between 10 and 2.5 micrometers (µm) in diameter; 'fine particles' or PM 2.5 are smaller than 2.5 µm.

While most anti-pollution do provide some protection only N99 Masks in India that are sold provide effective protection against PM 2.5. In India, Vogmask is the most popular brand which is N99 certified mask. It is sold in India by Nirvana Being, the company that has earned a good reputation for providing devices to deal with the pollution. The N99 certified Mask filters out 99.99 percent of PM 2.5 and is the one you should be buying if you need effective protection against air pollution.