Use of Respiratory Protective Equipment during and after Lifting of Public Health Restrictions due to the COVID-19 Pandemic

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has shown the importance of non-specific measures of infectious disease prevention, including the use of respiratory protective equipment. Despite the improvement in the epidemiological situation and gradual lifting of public health restrictions, some people keep wearing face masks.

Objective: To analyze the use of respiratory protective equipment in accordance with COVID-19 face mask requirements and after the end of the mask mandate among medical students in Moscow.

Materials and methods: The questionnaire-based survey was conducted in two stages in March 2021 and in March–April 2022 among 988 and 830 third year students of the Institute of Clinical Medicine, Sechenov University, respectively, to collect data on socio-demographic characteristics, the practice of wearing face masks in public places, and the incentives to use them. The observational study was carried out in March 2022 among 816 Russian and 96 foreign students by counting those wearing face masks in the classrooms.

Results: We established that 97.5 % of the respondents used respiratory protective equipment during the period of restrictive public health measures. The main reasons for doing that were a mask mandate due to coronavirus and the necessity of personal contacts with other people. The survey showed that masks were most often used in health facilities, supermarkets, pharmacies, subway, and at the university. During the first two weeks after abolishing mandatory wearing of face masks, 18.3 % of all the respondents continued their use, mainly out of concern for other people’s health, of whom 9.9 % and 89.6 % were Russian and foreign medical students, respectively. The second survey demonstrated that 7.2 % of the Russian medical students kept wearing masks in some settings later on. In case of yet another increase in the COVID-19 incidence, 97.6 % of the respondents intend to use respiratory protective equipment and 74.7 % of them plan to recommend this preventive measure to their relatives.

Study limitations: Due to the fact that only medical university students aged 20 to 23 took part in the research and in view of the short time period that had elapsed since lifting of masking requirements, it is of interest to survey various age and social population groups in a longer-term perspective.

Conclusions: Medical students continue using respiratory protective equipment after the restrictions are lifted, mainly to protect others.

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