Historical Perspectives on Respiratory Protection: The Mask

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The Mask: A History of Breathing Bad Air
Bruno J. Strasser & Thomas Schlich
Yale University Press, 2025
Published prior to Wellcome funding.

This book traces the long and varied history of respiratory masks, from improvised cloth coverings to industrial gas masks, and examines how societies have used face coverings to negotiate risk, responsibility, and care. Through cases spanning Renaissance Italy, industrialising Britain, wartime Europe, and contemporary clinical settings, After the Single Use researcher Bruno Strasser and co-author Schlich explore how attitudes toward masks reflect deeper cultural, political, and scientific debates.

The Mask offers a historically grounded look at the tensions between protection, communication, and trust that continue to shape public and medical responses to harmful air — insights that resonate strongly with After the Single Use’s work on the cultural and material histories of disposability in healthcare.