Originally Posted by
asgelle
You're not as bad as they are. You're worse. In a car, the exhaled droplets and aerosols are virtually entirely confined within the passenger compartment.
Until you get out of the car. Then those trapped and condensed droplets are concentrated on your person. The drops are also trapped in a container that allows them to to survive for a period of time.
On your bike, you're spewing possibly virus laden material into the atmosphere for others to inhale.
In to a turbulent atmosphere that is bathed in ultraviolet light. The concentration goes down significantly because the human is punching a human sized hole through the atmosphere and leaving a turbulent wake. Any droplets get mixed with air, dry out and get irradiated. Their survival time is significantly decreased in addition to a decreased concentration. In a car, the virus could last for hours while their survival in open air is on the order of minutes.
There is also the level of risk to consider. Spain has said that they don’t want cyclists out because of the possibility of accidents. I haven’t heard the same argument made for motorists, however. While occasionally a bicycle accident can result in severe injury, the rate of severe injury goes up significantly with speed and weight of the vehicle. Car accidents regularly take up far more resources in medical situations then bicycle accidents do. About 40,000 people are injured in bicycle accidents per year, most of them not life threatening. 3 million people are injured in automobile accidents per year, many with injuries that require lengthy hospital stays.
Finally, if you are showing symptoms,
stay home.