I stopped wearing masks in the Spring when the state took them off the mandatory list. Recently got tested for covid antibodies to see if I have any built-in defense. I have no antibodies and never got the vaccine. Fall is coming and covid or whatever the current virus du jour is, is rising; so mask season may come around again as the state goes back to mandatory masks.
I've been using new / old stock Henry Schein procedure masks for dentists from 1998 made in USA. (Yes, America used to make masks.) I found a couple hundred new masks I had in storage and had been using them. I used to buy the masks by the case when I worked in demolition. There were cheap enough so you could change them every few hours if you needed to. For heavy dirt I used 3M N95's, but back then they were not called N95's.
All the Chinese surgical masks I've tried look similar to this vintage 1998 mask, but you can't breath through the material. Consequently you end up breathing in unfiltered air sucked in from the sides of the mask. In other words the Chinese masks I've tried are just for show. To test surgical masks for filtering, form a seal around your lips with the mask material as you suck in air through your mouth. If you can't breath through the mask material...there you go...you got a decorator model!
Since the USA does not seem to make any surgical masks, I'm hoping that someone in China or elsewhere makes a decent filtering mask. I hate wearing N95 masks all the time. Any suggestions for masks you can actually breath through?