Dr. Wu Lien-teh (伍連德), who was born in Penang, Malaysia in 1879 invented the surgical face mask, considered the precursor to the N95 mask in response to the Manchurian Plague, which spread in northwestern China in 1910. In March 2021, Dr. Wu was honoured with a Google Doodle, depicting Wu assembling surgical masks and distributing them to reduce the risk of disease transmission.

source from: https://www.usatoday.com/…/face-mask…/6936312002/