The updated guidance coming from the U.S. Centers For Disease Control and Prevention on cloth face masks says they offer the least protection from COVID-19. 

Guthrie County Health Services Director Jotham Arber says that individuals who are at higher risk for serious illness need to consider putting away their cloth mask. Arber explains that studies show medical masks work extremely well like N95 or surgical masks. Arber states that having a mask that is designed to stop virus transmission is important now since they are widely available now. 

“Federal government is sending out free N95 (masks), you can pick those up at Walgreens and CVS and some of those other places you can order N95 and surgical masks and some of these other higher grade masks very readily now, and they’re not as expensive as they were.

He also says that the cloth masks were used back in 2020 when they were in short supply of medical grade masks.