As face masks become an indispensable part of life during the coronavirus pandemic, many people are confronting an uncomfortable fact: prolonged use can give rise to skin trouble. And as summer comes, the problem may get worse.
According to several clinics and a hospital in Tokyo, an increasing number of patients have been complaining of inflamed skin and other issues of sensitivity to masks, such as cuts behind the ears from the masks' elastic bands.
"As the humidity and temperature rise, the skin's condition inside the mask worsens. It gets damaged because of the friction between the mask and the skin," said Kotaro Yoshitake, the head of a dermatology and plastic surgery clinic in Tokyo.