Disposable Respirators are a type of personal protective equipment (PPE) used to protect against airborne contaminants. These respirators are usually worn on the face and provide light-duty, short-term breathing protection. They are designed to be worn once and then discarded or may be reused depending on the application. Disposable Respirators or masks can be used to protect against dust, mild irritants, and certain infectious diseases such as tuberculosis and avian influenza.

In its request for reconsideration and for an administrative stay, 3M argued that NIOSH has incorrectly judged disposable half mask respirators equivalent to respirators with replaceable filters; ANSI does not perform qualitative fit tests on these types of respirators; assigning a protection factor of five would force employers to purchase more expensive and less comfortable respiratory protection; there are available and accepted test methods to assess the fit of these respirators; and restricting their use to ten times the PEL for eight hours would force employers to spend significantly more money on supplemental respiratory protection.

Breathing Easy: The Essential Guide to Disposable Respirators

There are two major categories of respirators: particulate respirators and atmosphere-supplying respirators. The former include surgical masks, N95 respirators, and reusable full-face respirators such as elastomeric respirators. The latter are equipped with filters, cartridges, or canisters that filter out gases, vapors, aerosols, or a combination of these. They require fit testing before use. Some of these are also known as closed circuit and self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA), which have their own self-contained breathing air supply, or open circuit, which relies on an airline connection to a remote source of clean respirable air.