Nonpharmaceutical Measures for Pandemic Influenza in Nonhealthcare Settings - "There were 3 influenza pandemics in the 20th century, and there has been 1 so far in the 21st century. Local, national, and international health authorities regularly update their plans for mitigating the next influenza pandemic in light of the latest available evidence on the effectiveness of various control measures in reducing transmission. Here, we review the evidence base on the effectiveness of nonpharmaceutical personal protective measures and environmental hygiene measures in nonhealthcare settings and discuss their potential inclusion in pandemic plans. Although mechanistic studies support the potential effect of hand hygiene or face masks, evidence from 14 randomized controlled trials of these measures did not support a substantial effect on transmission of laboratory-confirmed influenza. We similarly found limited evidence on the effectiveness of improved hygiene and environmental cleaning. We identified several major knowledge gaps requiring further research, most fundamentally an improved characterization of the modes of person-to-person transmission."
Twitter removes Scott Atlas tweet that said masks were not effective - "The tweet, captured in screenshots, was flagged for violating Twitter's policy against spreading misleading information and is no longer visible to users. It linked to an online post published by the American Institute for Economic Research critical of coronavirus lockdowns and restrictions such as wearing masks."
Scientific research is only good when it supports the narrative
Meta-analysis on facemask use in community settings to prevent respiratory infection transmission shows no effect - "The authors reported an apparent benefit of facemasks use, which showed a significant reduction in the risk of influenza, influenza-like illness, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV), and SARS-CoV-2 transmission (pooled OR = 0.66, 95% confidence interval: 0.54–0.81). However, there are several methodological flaws in the study that might have led to misleading conclusions. In the meta-analyses on facemasks and influenza outcomes, the authors first meta-analyzed both clinical trials and case-control/retrospective observational studies, with the last studies overestimating the effect. Second, Chaabna et al. included five studies that did not have only face mask use as an intervention but were additionally introducing other interventions such as hand hygiene in the same group (Aiello et al., 2012, Aiello et al., 2010, Cowling et al., 2009, Simmerman et al., 2011, Suess et al., 2012), a condition that limits the attribution of any observed effect to the use of facemask only. Therefore, their conclusion, "there is enough evidence that medical facemasks are effective in community settings to prevent transmission of respiratory viral infections," is not supported by their analyses (Chaabna et al., 2020).Based on the ten clinical trials included in the meta-analysis, we reviewed and reanalyzed the data to compare whether the use of facemask as a sole intervention was associated with the transmission of respiratory infections in the community setting. From the ten RCTs included in Chaabna et al.'s study, five compared facemasks use alone versus a control group, while three studies compared medical facemasks use alone with the combined intervention of face mask and handwashing (Aiello et al., 2012, Aiello et al., 2010, Cowling et al., 2009, Simmerman et al., 2011, Suess et al., 2012). As observed in Figure 1, there were no significant differences between medical facemasks use only and controls in the odds of developing laboratory-confirmed influenza and influenza-like illness. Similarly, no differences in laboratory-confirmed influenza risk were observed when comparing mask use solely versus the combined intervention of face mask and handwashing, indicating that facemask as the sole intervention in the community is not associated with reducing respiratory infection. Given the studies used medical masks, cloth masks' efficacy is expected to be even lower; a randomized cluster trial showed that respiratory infection is higher among health care personnel using cloth masks than using medical masks (MacIntyre et al., 2015). Several systematic reviews and meta-analyses suggest a potential benefit of facemasks in viral respiratory infections; however, most of them include mostly non-randomized studies, RCTs with serious methodological issues, and studies mainly derived from the health care setting (Chu et al., 2020, Liang et al., 2020). On the other hand, the systematic review and meta-analysis of Saunders-Hastings et al. observed a significant protective effect of regular hand hygiene regarding 2009 pandemic influenza transmission risk (OR = 0.62; 95% CI 0.52–0.73; and I2 = 0%), finding no benefit with facemask use (OR = 0.53; 95% CI 0.16–1.71; and I2 = 48%) (Saunders-Hastings et al., 2017). Because of these divergent results and the lack of high-quality research in this area, strong recommendations for facemask use in the community context should be issued with caution until new evidence is available to show their effectiveness. This is even more important, considering that several studies showed that mask use is associated with headache incidence and worsening of preexisting headache (Lim et al., 2006, Rebmann et al., 2013, Szeinuk et al., 2000, Radonovich, 2009, Shenal et al., 2011)."
Effectiveness of Adding a Mask Recommendation to Other Public Health Measures to Prevent SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Danish Mask Wearers: A Randomized Controlled Trial - "Although the difference observed was not statistically significant, the 95% CIs are compatible with a 46% reduction to a 23% increase in infection."
The only RCT on masks and covid. Though sadly it didn't assess source control
On the Suppressed Danish Mask Study - "The researchers behind a large and unique Danish study on the effect of wearing a mask have great difficulties in getting their research results published. One of the participating professors in the study concedes that the still secret research result could be considered ‘controversial’."
Top scientific journals reject 'controversial' Danish study on effectiveness of face masks against coronavirus: Report - "the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine at Oxford published a paper showing that a “recent crop of trials added 9,112 participants to the total randomised denominator of 13,259 and showed that masks alone have no significant effect in interrupting the spread of ILI or influenza in the general population, nor in healthcare workers.”... Heneghan and Jefferson also said they remain skeptical of nonrandomized clinical trials such as the one published in the Lancet, concluding masks reduce virus transmission. "We consider it is unwise to infer causation based on regional geographical observations as several proponents of masks have done.""
One cannot go against the narrative
Using face masks in the community: first update. Effectiveness in reducing transmission of COVID-19 - "The role of face masks in the control and prevention of COVID-19 remains an issue of debate. Prior to COVID-19, most studies assessing the effectiveness of face masks as a protective measure in the community came from studies on influenza, which provided little evidence to support their use... The evidence regarding the effectiveness of medical face masks for the prevention of COVID-19 in the community is compatible with a small to moderate protective effect, but there are still significant uncertainties about the size of this effect. Evidence for the effectiveness of non-medical face masks, face shields/visors and respirators in the community is scarce and of very low certainty... There is evidence of low to moderate certainty for the use of medical face masks providing a small to moderate protective effect against COVID-19 in the community, both in terms of personal protection as well as source control (protection of others). Most, but not all, studies show a favourable effect for medical face masks for protecting against COVID-19. However, this effect was not statistically significant in several studies, and the quality of the evidence was assessed as low in several studies, so the results should be interpreted with caution. Looking at the evidence from studies in healthcare settings or other diseases than COVID-19 (i.e. influenza and other respiratory viral infections) did not improve the certainty of the evidence. Some of these studies show a statistically significant favourable effect and others a non-statistically significant favourable effect, while a few studies show an unfavourable effect for the use of medical face masks"
Given the similarity of influenza and covid in transmission mechanisms, it's no surprise the evidence is similar
Presumably the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control is going to be called covid deniers by covid hystericists
Face masks in classrooms 'devastating' for deaf children - "“With England’s 35,000 deaf pupils close to a return to education, the goalposts on face masks have moved yet again. Public health must take priority, but bringing face masks into classrooms will have a devastating effect on deaf children’s studies, mental health and ability to take part in lessons."
Corona children studies "Co-Ki": First results of a Germany-wide registry on mouth and nose covering (mask) in children - "The average wearing time of the mask was 270 minutes per day. Impairments caused by wearing the mask were reported by 68% of the parents. These included irritability (60%), headache (53%), difficulty concentrating (50%), less happiness (49%), reluctance to go to school/kindergarten (44%), malaise (42%) impaired learning (38%) and drowsiness or fatigue (37%)... This world's first registry for recording the effects of wearing masks in children is dedicated to a new research question. The frequency of the registry’s use and the spectrum of symptoms registryed indicate the importance of the topic and call for representative surveys, randomized controlled trials with various masks and a renewed risk-benefit assessment for the vulnerable group of children: adults need to collecticely reflect the circumstances under which they would be willing to take a residual risk upon themselves in favor of enabling children to have a higher quality of life without having to wear a mask."
Clearly the minuscule risk of covid transmission is worth burdening kids with masks despite the high evidence of harm, since masks are the current shibboleth.
Commentary: Physiological and Psychological Impact of Face Mask Usage during the COVID-19 Pandemic - "Wearing a mask does produce a small increase in breathing resistance caused by the mask material filtering particles and aerosols in the air and any moisture that is trapped in the mask material. One consistently documented negative impact of wearing a mask for a long period of time is an increase in the development of headaches in people with a history of headaches... The impact of mask wearing onbasic psychological needs (autonomy, relatedness, and competence) is likely a contributor to thecontroversy associated with wearing masks during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States;however, future research is needed to empirically test this theoretical evidence"
Even in adults, masks are not side effect free. But with covid, cost-benefit analysis is thrown out of the window
Hydroxychloroquine RCTs: 'Ethically, the Choice Is Clear' - "when you look for HCQ studies in COVID-19, you will find a ton — roughly 900 published at last count. The vast majority of these are observational studies.Why do people like me put so much more weight in randomized controlled trials (RCTs) than observational studies? It's simple. In an observational study, the observed effect of the exposure of interest (HCQ) on the outcome of interest is due to both its true causal effect and the characteristics of who was selected for treatment.In a randomized trial, because the selection is random, the observed effect is due solely to the true effect of the treatment... The zinc issue falls into this "no true Scotsman" land of HCQ studies. Any negative study can be dismissed: "Oh, you didn't give it early enough, or late enough, or with zinc, or with azithromycin, or on Sunday," or whatever. That's not how science works. I'm not saying that any of these studies are perfect, just that they are the best evidence we have right now. The burden of proof is to show that the drug works. Though I'm sure that pharma would be stoked to be able to argue that their latest negative trial can be ignored because their billion-dollar drug wasn't given in concert with vitamin C or whatever."
Strange how those who champion masks love observational studies and dismiss the RCTs but ignore observational studies that show that Hydroxychloroquine works
The scandal of poor epidemiological research - "Something surely must be wrong with epidemiology when the new editors of a leading journal in the field entitle their inaugural offering, “Epidemiology—is it time to call it a day?” Observational epidemiology has not had a good press in recent years. Conflicting results from epidemiological studies of the risks of daily life, such as coffee, hair dye, or hormones, are frequently and eagerly reported in the popular press, providing a constant source of anxiety for the public. In many cases deeply held beliefs, given credibility by numerous observational studies over long periods of time, are challenged only when contradicted by randomised trials. In the most recent example, a Cochrane review of randomised trials shows that antioxidant vitamins do not prevent gastrointestinal cancer and may even increase all cause mortality... A protective effect of hormone replacement therapy was evident in studies that did not control for socioeconomic status, but not in studies that did (figure). Higher socioeconomic position is strongly associated with both more frequent use of hormone replacement therapy and lower risk of coronary heart disease... In many studies 20% or more of the findings may be erroneous, rather than the expected 5% false positive associations (P < 0.05)"
Of course this mean that the observational studies about masks are proof that they work
Face mask rule for school children imposed 'without proper research' professor says - "Dr Carl Heneghan said that the mask doctrine came into place even as the deputy chief medical officer admitted there was no strong evidence they would help with the disease. This was despite the social and psychological damage masking pupils would cause, he said. He pointed out that with drug interventions, high quality testing was required before they were implemented... “There have been far more deaths from road traffic accidents around the world this year for example than from coronavirus, but we don't force everyone to drive at 10mph. "There is no such thing as zero risk but we now have a society where there is a single focus on one disease."We could have improved our understanding of the role of masks at the height of the infection...but if we don't carry out the right research we won't know what makes a difference as we go into winter."Other experts have expressed alarm about the use of face coverings among schoolchildren highlighting the importance of facial expression for communication, social development and for people who have hearing problems."
Evidence doesn't matter when it comes to covid hysteria. In fact, evidence is considered a bad thing
Calvin Cheng - Posts | Facebook - "Hong Kong is having a resurgence of covid cases.There is a complex combination of factors that determines whether there is an outbreak, repeated waves of infections etc.This includes luck.There was a whole lot of chatter of Singapore’s relative failure compared to Hong Kong a few months ago, especially when we were in lockdown.People who liked simplistic explanations argued that it was because Hong Kong started wearing masks from the start and we didn’t.Hong Kong never stopped wearing masks. Yet now, they have an outbreak of over 100 community cases a day. Their leader has described their situation as critical.The only thing that works for sure is social distancing... I find a lot of people have a naive blind faith in masks. They think just because people are masked, they can go out into crowds and not wash their hands."
BBC Radio 4 - From Our Own Correspondent Podcast, Can Bosnia move on from genocide? - "Cool Berliners have not only accepted masks, many have embraced them with style. Black looks good with tattoos and has a sexy touch of the fetish. Or if you want to show you're a bit of a rebel, a bandana is the bad boy option. Looking good while covering your face is a serious business here. German Vogue has an in-depth article about women's hairstyles that work with masks. In case you're wondering, a top knot is judged to be the most flattering look to frame those eyes. Men's Health magazine also features a range of masks to match a suit and tie, including a rather pricey tailored tweed number. Interestingly, before face coverings became mandatory in German shops in April, there was a very similar debate that in the UK over recent weeks, the German government said it was recommended, but that the science wasn't clear... Then, two and a half months ago, the scientific evidence in favor of wearing masks became clear"
"Scientific evidence"
D.C. Exempts Lawmakers, Government Employees From New Mask Order - "Washington, D.C., mayor Muriel Bowser (D.) issued a universal masking order for her city Wednesday but exempted lawmakers, judges, and federal employees."
Gregor Vuga on Twitter - "If this was an rpg and you found an item with 30% disease resist and you had an empty slot you'd equip that motherfucker. Wear your damn masks."
More like +5% disease resist to others, with 1% chance to proc. And there's still innate disease resist. And masks increase proc chance. +1% encumbrance, +5% in summer. 4x encumbrance if allergies or sweating heavily
This is revealing in showing how masks are treated as magical objects and holy totems, and refusal to worship them is met with anger (I got blocked by a mask fetishist when I pointed out the peer reviewed articles he presented didn't actually say what he claimed about masks)
COMMENTARY: Masks-for-all for COVID-19 not based on sound data - "cloth masks and face coverings are likely to have limited impact on lowering COVID-19 transmission, because they have minimal ability to prevent the emission of small particles, offer limited personal protection with respect to small particle inhalation, and should not be recommended as a replacement for physical distancing or reducing time in enclosed spaces with many potentially infectious people. We are very concerned about messaging that suggests cloth masks or face coverings can replace physical distancing. We also worry that the public doesn't understand the limitations of cloth masks and face coverings when we observe how many people wear their mask under their nose or even under their mouth, remove their masks when talking to someone nearby, or fail to practice physical distancing when wearing a mask...
We were able to identify only two household studies in which surgical masks were worn by the index patient only, as source control. Neither of these found a significant impact on secondary disease transmission, although both studies had important limitations."
People get very upset when you pull away their security blankets
"If everyone wore masks the case count would be double digits within a few weeks." - Mask fetishist. Yet, even the scientists who claim that masks work don't make such grand claims for them
expert reaction to a study looking at mandatory face masks and number of COVID-19 infections in New York, Wuhan and Italy - "“In my opinion the study “Identifying airborne transmission as the dominant route for the spread of COVID-19” by Zhanga and colleagues is deeply flawed and its conclusions highly suspect.
My main criticisms are that
1. the analysis was very simplistic fitting just a simple linear regression model to cumulative case numbers. Outbreaks never follow such a straight line for very long and it was inevitable that the curve would fall below the line eventually.
2. The authors have included no control countries/states so that they did not in any way check that such slackening of increase was due to facemasks or something else or consistent across multiple countries whether or not facemasks were being used.
3. The authors do not appear to account for the lag between date of infection and reporting. Typically there is a lag about a week or more for people to develop symptoms, and then for those symptomatic people to seek a test and then for the test to take a couple of days for that test to be reported on and positive results to be included in the summary figures. It is clear from figure 2 in the paper, that case numbers were declining before facemasks were recommended and certainly before facemasks use could possibly have influenced the trajectory of the outbreak in New York.
“This last point in particular severely undermines the author’s conclusions.
“So in conclusion, this paper does not provide any convincing evidence or analysis behind its suggestions that facemasks reduce disease by 40% and its conclusions are almost certainly false."...
“The authors fit a straight line to the data and observe that case numbers are reduced compared to this linear trend. However epidemiological curves display exponential growth and decay, rather than a linear trend. Fitting a linear trend to any part of the decay curve will result in the phenomenon seen.”...
"the authors’ conclusions appear to depend on selecting a particular set of dates to begin and end the analysis; if the conclusions were robust they should hold across different time periods... we cannot confidently conclude anything from this paper""
Cluster randomised controlled trial to examine medical mask use as source control for people with respiratory illness - "Rates of clinical respiratory illness (relative risk (RR) 0.61, 95% CI 0.18 to 2.13), ILI (RR 0.32, 95% CI 0.03 to 3.13) and laboratory-confirmed viral infections (RR 0.97, 95% CI 0.06 to 15.54) were consistently lower in the mask arm compared with control, although not statistically significant. A post hoc comparison between the mask versus no-mask groups showed a protective effect against clinical respiratory illness, but not against ILI and laboratory-confirmed viral respiratory infections... Primary end points measured in household contacts included: (1) clinical respiratory illness (CRI), defined as two or more respiratory symptoms (cough, nasal congestion, runny nose, sore throat or sneezes) or one respiratory symptom and a systemic symptom (chill, lethargy, loss of appetite, abdominal pain, muscle or joint aches); (2) ILI, defined as fever ≥38°C plus one respiratory symptom; and (3) laboratory-confirmed viral respiratory infection, defined as detection of adenoviruses, human metapneumovirus, coronaviruses 229E/NL63 and OC43/HKU1, parainfluenzaviruses 1, 2 and 3, influenza viruses A and B, respiratory syncytial virus A and B, or rhinovirus A/B by nucleic acid testing (NAT) using a commercial multiplex PCR (Seegen, Seoul, Korea)"
This is a direct test of the source control hypothesis and rejects it. The common cold is an influenza-like illness and can be caused by coronaviruses too
Effectiveness of surgical, KF94, and N95 respirator masks in blocking SARS-CoV-2: a controlled comparison in 7 patients
This study measured SAR-CoV-2 viral load in 7 patients coughing without a mask, with a surgical mask, with a KF94 mask and with a N95 respirator. Putting aside 2 who had no viral load regardless of treatment group, the paper found that out of 5 patients, a surgical mask reduced viral load in 3 (though 1 seemed marginal) and actually increased it in 2 (the KF94s and N95s performed much better). So even in theory, the claim that surgical masks reduce viral transmission is suspect
Deborah Cohen on Twitter - "We had been told by various sources WHO committee reviewing the evidence had not backed masks but they recommended them due to political lobbying. This point was put to WHO who did not deny We said some people think we should not wait for RCTs before putting policies in place"
Postoperative wound infections and surgical face masks: a controlled study - "After 1,537 operations performed with face masks, 73 (4.7%) wound infections were recorded and, after 1,551 operations performed without face masks, 55 (3.5%) infections occurred. This difference was not statistically significant (p greater than 0.05) and the bacterial species cultured from the wound infections did not differ in any way, which would have supported the fact tha the numerical difference was a statistically "missed" difference. These results indicated that the use of face masks might be reconsidered. Masks may be used to protect the operating team from drops of infected blood and from airborne infections, but have not been proven to protect the patient operated by a healthy operating team."
Ironic, given that often mask fetishists mock those who don't think they work by saying that you'd want your surgeon to wear one during surgery
As we know, in science replication is key and while this is not an exact replication it tests the same mechanism so this result being consistent gives us great confidence that it is a reliable one. Consider too that if anything, mask wearing in surgery would exaggerate mask effectiveness compared to mask wearing in the general population - baseline infection rates will be lower since operating theatres are sterile environments, making any effect more evident, and medical personnel are going to be using masks optimally, unlike the general population
Does evidence based medicine support the effectiveness of surgical facemasks in preventing postoperative wound infections in elective surgery? - "There was no increase in infection rate in 1980 when masks were discarded. In fact there was significant decrease in infection rate (p < 0.05). From the limited randomized trials it is still not clear that whether wearing surgical face masks harms or benefit the patients undergoing elective surgery."
A covid-19 mask fetishist doctor I cited the findings on postoperative wound infection to wasn't happy when I pointed out that the evidence for masks during surgery wasn't good either. But then doctors aren't very good at following evidence based medicine, as Freakonomics pointed out
Disposable surgical face masks for preventing surgical wound infection in clean surgery. - "From the limited results it is unclear whether the wearing of surgical face masks by members of the surgical team has any impact on surgical wound infection rates for patients undergoing clean surgery."
Study: Airbags, antilock brakes not likely to reduce accidents, injuries - "Researchers have determined that airbags and antilock braking systems do not reduce the likelihood of accidents or injuries because they may encourage more aggressive driving, thwarting the potential benefits of such safety features.The behavior responsible for this seeming paradox is called the offset hypotheses, which predicts that consumers adapt to innovations meant to improve safety by becoming less vigilant about safety... Claims of safety benefits for airbags and antilock brakes assume that motorists drive the same way regardless of whether their cars are equipped with the safety features."However, if you drive a car without these safety features and then you get behind the wheel of a newer car, you see the difference immediately," said Mannering, who owns a vintage MG sports car and a newer vehicle equipped with many of the latest safety technologies. "The contrast is dramatic. When I'm driving the MG, I definitely make a special effort not to tailgate or accelerate quickly when roads are slick because I don't have the antilock brakes, traction control and the other advanced safety features of the newer car.""
Some people claim risk compensation doesn't exist
An investigation of behavioural adaptation to airbags and antilock brakes among taxi drivers - "Taxis with ABS had significantly shorter time headways than taxis without ABS. There were no relationships with speed, possibly because dense traffic during the observation period may have prevented the drivers from driving at their preferred speed. Simple comparisons also showed fewer lane changes and a lower rate of seat-belt use among drivers of taxis with ABS. However, multiple regression analyses indicated that the latter effects might be explained by driver background factors or by car characteristics other than ABS or airbag. The headway results support the hypothesis of larger compensation for accident-reducing than for injury-reducing measures."
(PDF) Moral hazard in the insurance industry - "The evidence for ex ante moral hazard (i.e., insurance-induced increases in risk-taking) is rather weak but suggests that people engage less in preventive behaviors that are costly and hard to maintain when they obtain insurance. The evidence for ex post moral hazard (i.e., insurance-induced increases in usage of insured services) overwhelmingly indicates that it exists"
Risk Compensation in PrEP: An Old Debate Emerges Yet Again - "Mathematical modeling studies have suggested that HIV incidence in MSM in the United States and other industrialized nations may be increasing because of increased risk behavior in the era of ART [antiretroviral therapy]. Furthermore, there has been an increase in syphilis and gonorrhea rates in MSM across the United States, much of which is among HIV-infected people, perhaps an unintended consequence of risk compensation associated with greater access to and use of ART. In a large meta-analysis of HIV therapy and risk behavior literature, it was found that individuals who thought ART reduced the likelihood of HIV transmission or lessened the likelihood of transmission were more likely to engage in unprotected sex. Additionally, unprotected sex was associated with the belief that an undetectable viral load affords protection against HIV. Finally, several studies in developed countries have found increases in unprotected anal intercourse after ART with casual partners in both HIV-infected and uninfected individuals. Findings from these studies suggest that some risk compensation has occurred in the United States with increased use of ART for treatment."
Wear A Mask, But Remember That Doesn't Make You Invincible To Coronavirus - "even before the protests, it seemed like people were willing to take more risks as soon as they put on personal protective equipment, like a mask or gloves. Sometimes they’re small slips, like not staying the recommended 6-feet apart. Other times, they’re more damning like crowding into a park on a sunny day. So why does a simple piece of fabric or latex make us feel like we’re Covid-proof?... “There are psychological factors that make us not anticipate unintended consequences,” explains social psychologist and assistant professor at Washington State University Joyce Ehlinger, mentioning how prohibition actually increased alcohol consumption. First, the way we assess risk and make decisions is inherently flawed.“People are not so good at assessing exposure to a risk,” says Ann Bostrom, a professor at University of Washington whose research focuses on risk perception, communication, and management.She notes how both technically and subjectively it’s hard to evaluate by how much the risk of infection increases if we are outside versus inside.Sure, right now we know that being in an elevator is riskier than being in a park, but we can’t quantify by how much. Is it 2%? 5%? 20%? Honestly, no one knows.“Trying to adjust our mask usage to correspond with that is hard to do,” adds Bostrom.Also, while we’d all love to think we logically assess risk, leaving our emotions out of it, that’s not the case – especially in a pandemic. while we’d all love to think we logically assess risk, leaving our emotions out of it, that’s not the case – especially in a pandemic. According to a new study slated to be published later this year in the journal Frontiers, during a time of pandemic emotions are a huge part of how we look at risk. “Risk perception is based in feelings,” says the paper’s lead author Spike Lee, an associate professor of marketing at University of Toronto. He goes on to explain that because the current pandemic is constantly on our minds but also highly uncertain we tend to act irrationally. “What we found is that in times of a contagious pandemic if you make that disease salient then participants overestimate their risk in all domains”... “When people think about assessing any kind of risk or making a decision of some sort, there’s often a tendency to focus on what’s right in front of you,” explains Bostrom. “So that means you may not be considering more than one aspect of the problem or one potential solution to the problem. So that can lead to an anchoring or a specific focus on what comes to mind first. It is an efficient approach but it can lead to satisfying too soon. ” Bostrom continues, saying that because protective equipment has been front and center talking point since the beginning of the pandemic this can result in bounded cognition or bounded rationality... many people don’t think further than the mask or gloves. It’s like as soon as people put on a mask or gloves they forget about all the other risk avoidance behaviors – like social distancing, hand washing, etc. – that also helps reduce the risk of catching or spreading the virus... a study done in 1994 found that people drove faster and more recklessly when they wore seatbelts. Another study looking at bicycle helmets found “evidence to suggest that some cyclists ride less cautiously when helmeted because they feel more protected”. And it’s not just protective equipment that can have this effect, one study published in 2011 found that dietary supplements gave people an illusory sense of invulnerability."
Risk compensation
Masks not enough to stop COVID-19's spread without distancing, study finds: Even though common mask materials block most of the droplets that spread the virus, that may not be enough at close distances - "The study also did not account for leakage from masks, whether worn properly or improperly, which can add to the number of droplets that make their way into the air."
Preliminary report on surgical mask induced deoxygenation during major surgery - "pulse rates of the surgeon's increase and SpO2 decrease after the first hour."
High heat, humidity can be a problem when wearing a mask outdoors, experts say - "Soaring temperatures and thick humid air can cause breathing difficulties for a number of people as summer approaches each year.Add a cloth face mask to the equation and those problems can be further exacerbated... health experts say it's best to ditch the mask when walking around outside. "When you're breathing through a mask you're having to work a little bit harder to breathe in the first place, especially depending on how thick your mask is," said Dr. David Price, chair of the department of family medicine at McMaster University in Hamilton. "And then the other thing is you're rebreathing some of your air, so it's heating it up a little bit."So you've got not only the heat on the outside, but now you've got the heat inside the mask too."... Kids, who are typically at greater risk than adults for dehydration and heat illness, should also avoid wearing masks outdoors, "unless they are sick and you're going to be in close contact with somebody else," Price added.Wearing a mask in humid conditions can cause more problems than just difficulty breathing, though. "It's really unhealthy to wear a mask for prolonged periods because it collects bacteria and bacteria proliferate," said Colin Furness, an epidemiologist at the University of Toronto. "And the warmer and more moist the environment is, the happier the bacteria are to multiply... "If we're outside, regardless of weather, we should be staying more than six feet away and avoiding situations when we can't," he said. "I don't want anyone thinking that wearing a mask is a substitute for physical distancing — it isn't."... masks will be less effective if they get wet from sweat or humidity because "moisture reduces the filtration.""
New study reveals blueprint for getting out of Covid-19 lockdown - "Relaxing stay-at-home orders and allowing some types of non-essential businesses such as shops to reopen are the lowest risk measures to get the UK and other European countries out of lockdown – according to research from the University of East Anglia.Researchers studied the success of different social distancing measures across 30 European countries – in terms of how effective they have been at reducing the number of Covid-19 cases and deaths.They found that closing schools, prohibiting mass gatherings and the closure of some non-essential business, particularly in the hospitality sector, were the most effective at stopping the spread of the disease.Enforcing the wearing of facemasks in public was not found to make additional impact... “The use of face coverings initially seems to have had a protective effect. However, after day 15 of the face covering advisories or requirements, we saw that the number of cases started to rise – with a similar pattern for the number of deaths.“Face coverings may even be associated with increased risk, but the data quality for this is very uncertain.“The results on face coverings are too preliminary to reliably inform policy, but what results are available do not support their widespread use in the community."
Genius Trump Wears Mask Causing Media To Question Effectiveness Of Masks | The Babylon Bee
Walmart Now Requires All Shoppers To Wear Pants | The Babylon Bee - "In a move that's being called "unprecedented tyranny," Walmart is now requiring all shoppers to wear pants in their stores. Americans everywhere slammed Walmart for the move, saying it amounted to an infringement on our constitutional rights."
BBC Radio 4 - Best of Today, 'We will have an army of volunteers…to remind passengers to put face coverings on' - "[On an alleged u-turn on masks on public transport] ‘Because we know that from the 15th of this month when non essential resale will reopen, and secondary schools years 10 and 12 will go back, the public transport will, for the first time be busier. And it's not been at this point used by more than about 5% of its usual’...
‘We've seen pictures of packed tube trains and there has been crowding. And this hasn't been-’
‘I’ve been tracking this very, very carefully. So and I asked-’
‘It’s a political choice, isn't it, because the science hasn't changed all this’
‘Let me answer the first question now, before we sort of let the idea that the transport system’s been overcrowded, there's only been about 5% of passengers on that. I asked Sir Peter Hendy, who ran the Olympics transport and is a commissioner, was the Commissioner for TfL. And is chair of Network Rail to look at this very carefully, and we tracked it on a day by day basis. I can literally tell you, the trains where there was an issue because the train was broken down or at Canning Town and those pictures were shared very widely but actually, but actually the broad picture is there have been one or two people sitting in carriages a lot of the time. So wearing face coverings, although we said it's a you know, an optional thing, wasn't something which needed to be compulsory. But on the 15th we know that there'll be more people on the transport system. So we will want to say it's compulsory, it’s a condition of travel… [on the other hand,] in a shop, you may well pass somebody and the, the guidance acknowledges you might be near somebody for a short period of time. But then you're going to move on, but in a carriage or on a bus… on public transport, you could be next to somebody for 10, 20 minutes, 30 minutes, and so there's a much larger chance of being close to somebody for a longer period of time. Plus the guidance for shops is don't let the shop become overcrowded. And that's something that you can control with queues outside the shops where we used to them now 2 metre queues outside. You don't have that option in quite the same way on public transport so it's clearly a different environment'"
George Takei on Twitter - "Voting is like wearing a mask: If enough of us do it, we’ll save ourselves from this nightmare."
As I said long ago, people would latch on to masks as some magic talisman
Coronavirus: eating more cabbage and cucumber might reduce death rate, European study says - "This could be to do with a protein in humans called Nrf2. Sars-Cov-2, the virus that causes the Covid-19 disease, can cause serious inflammation in severely ill patients, including generating damaging oxygen particles. Nrf2 can bind with these particles to reduce their harm – and that is where cabbage and cucumber come in.Previous studies have suggested the vegetables have natural compounds – curcumin, sulforaphane and vitamin D – that can boost the production of Nrf2."
Like many of the studies touting masks this is both observational and has a proposed mechanism of effect. And since many people like observational nutrition studies...
Kimchi protects against COVID-19, a study says
The lead researcher is the same as in the one above but the research is made to sound different
'We see no point in wearing a face mask,' Sweden's top virus expert says, touting the country's improving COVID numbers - "Tegnell has consistently argued that Sweden’s approach is more sustainable than the sudden lockdowns imposed elsewhere. With the risk that Covid-19 might be around for years, he says completely shutting down society isn’t a long-term option... many countries that thought they’d brought the virus under control are now seeing second waves. Tegnell called those developments “worrying.”"
Lambton’s top doctor responds to Ontario’s new mandatory mask rule - "Dr. Sudit Ranade, Lambton’s medical officer of health, said Monday the decision points to the province wanting to show Ontarians it’s doing everything it can to slow the second surge.“I think it’s a response because you’re pressured to feel like we need to do something,” he said. “The underlying driver of transmission is something that you really can’t control that much without getting people on board, without encouraging people and empowering people to comply.”But he also said he’s not sure it’ll be enough. Ranade pointed out several cities and countries around the world that started with bylaws or policies requiring indoor mask use were later pressured to do more. In some places, masks are now required even in outdoor settings, he said.“That’s why you find this increasing need to add restrictions and restrictions because the underlying driver of disease is something that’s actually very difficult to legislate and control”"
Masking lack of evidence with politics - "The increasing polarised and politicised views on whether to wear masks in public during the current COVID-19 crisis hides a bitter truth on the state of contemporary research and the value we pose on clinical evidence to guide our decisions. In 2010, at the end of the last influenza pandemic, there were six published randomised controlled trials with 4,147 participants focusing on the benefits of different types of masks. Two were done in healthcare workers and four in family or student clusters. The face mask trials for influenza-like illness (ILI) reported poor compliance, rarely reported harms and revealed the pressing need for future trials. Despite the clear requirement to carry out further large, pragmatic trials a decade later, only six had been published: five in healthcare workers and one in pilgrims. This recent crop of trials added 9,112 participants to the total randomised denominator of 13,259 and showed that masks alone have no significant effect in interrupting the spread of ILI or influenza in the general population, nor in healthcare workers... Only one randomised trial (n=569) included cloth masks. This trial found ILI rates were 13 times higher in Vietnamese hospital workers allocated to cloth masks compared to medical/surgical masks, RR 13.25, (95%CI 1.74 to 100.97) and over three times higher when compared to no masks, RR 3.49 (95%CI 1.00 to 12.17)... Many countries have gone onto mandate masks for the public in various settings. Several others – Denmark, and Norway – generally do not. Norway’s Institute for Public Health reported that if masks did work then any difference in infection rates would be small when infection rates are low: assuming 20% asymptomatics and a risk reduction of 40% for wearing masks, 200 000 people would need to wear one to prevent one new infection per week... We consider it is unwise to infer causation based on regional geographical observations as several proponents of masks have done. Spikes in cases can easily refute correlations, compliance with masks and other measures is often variable, and confounders cannot be accounted for in such observational research... The small number of trials and lateness in the pandemic cycle is unlikely to give us reasonably clear answers and guide decision-makers. This abandonment of the scientific modus operandi and lack of foresight has left the field wide open for the play of opinions, radical views and political influence"
The New York Times is seriously suggesting that we should wear TWO masks at once to fight Covid - "while we're at it why not three or four? Or 5? Or mandatory hazmat suits? Or giant hamster balls so we can roll around the city without human contact in a beautiful, germ-free, depressed dystopia.We must be safe, even if it kills us!"
Top Infectious Disease Expert Says Double Masking ‘Actually Enhances Your Ability To Get Infected’ - "An infectious disease expert who served on President Joe Biden’s COVID-19 Advisory Board during the presidential transition says wearing two face masks as a precautionary measure against COVID-19 may actually do more harm than good.Michael Osterholm said on NBC’s “Meet The Press” that double masking could raise the chances of becoming infected with the virus. “When we talk about double masking, remember what we’re really talking about is just trying to prevent the virus from being excreted by me into the air or me inhaling the virus from someone else in the air, and it’s both a function of face fit and face filtration,” Osterholm said.Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said “think about your swim goggles. When’s the last time anybody leaked at the lenses? They leak at the fit.”“So, what we’re concerned about is that many of these face cloth coverings do have already compromised fit or filtration capacity,” he said. “If you add on another mask, you may actually make it tougher for the air to move through the two-cloth area, and then at that point, it causes more air to actually leak around the sides, which actually enhances your ability to get infected.”... Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases who served on President Trump’s White House Coronavirus Task Force and is now President Biden’s chief medical adviser on COVID-19, said last month that wearing two masks is likely more effective than wearing one"
FAUCI: 'There’s No Data' Indicating Double-Masking Works - "a mere five days after saying that double-masking was “common sense,” Fauci seemed to walk back that statement... Of course, Fauci is the same guy who praised Governor Cuomo and his COVID-19 response, so, as far as I’m concerned, Fauci lost all credibility last summer."
Double-masking: double the virtue? - "Reporting on Fauci’s endorsement, CNBC upped the ante even further, producing a graphic extolling the benefits of triple-masking... it would be naive to think the media’s push for double-masking is really about its potential health benefits. Since the start of the pandemic, mask-wearing has been refracted through all the usual culture-war tropes.For instance, the same New York Times which is campaigning for double-masking has declared that ‘mask-slipping’ (allowing your mask to fall below your nose) is the new ‘man-spreading’.During the 2020 election, the media reported polling suggesting that mask-wearing could be linked to voting intentions, with ‘deplorable’ Trump supporters more likely to shun the mask. Those who are seen without masks are apparently worthy of expulsion from polite society. Tales of aggressive mask-enforcement – not just by police, but by self-righteous members of the public – are rife"
Masks produced by slave labour in China on sale in Belgium - "the masks are manufactured under conditions of forced labour by members of the Uyghur minority community – a group of Muslims originating in Turkey and living in the north-west of China."
They're not even pretending any more. Watch as Governor Cuomo lectures us about the importance of wearing a mask while no one is wearing a mask. - "Cuomo is not wearing a mask. The five people seated at the table are not wearing masks. And they're all inside."
WestJet cancels flight because of mask dispute with child - "Safwan Choudhry says WestJet wanted his 19-month-old to wear a mask, but the baby girl would not stop crying.The airline says the issue was not with the infant, who is below the age required to wear a mask, but with Mr Choudhry's three-year-old... A video taken with Mr Choudhry's phone shows his older daughter wearing a mask on the plane, after police arrived on board.He says while some passengers were very irritated with his family, "overwhelmingly" people on the plane supported them. Many spoke up in defence of the family, as their youngest cried, he says... The officer later confirms that when he arrived, the oldest child was wearing a mask... A fellow passenger, Marian Nur, also recorded some of the interactions with flight staff, because she was worried the family was being targeted because of their race and religion - Mr Choudhry's wife wears a hijab. "I was so shocked, the parents never raised their voices, they never got angry with the attendants, they were just trying to reason with them""
When covid hysteria clashes with older liberal obsessions
Avoiding eye contact 'everyday racism'
Women in masks report rise in 'aggressive eye contact' from men - "an expert warns they 'provide anonymity' for threatening behaviour"
You can't win, for multiple reasons
I'd Do Anything [OC] : comics - "White man with rifle and "pee pee poo poo" hat: "I love America!! I'll do anything for this country! I'll live in a bunker! Fight in the hills! Anything!
Offscreen person: "Please wear a mask in public to protect others"
White man: *triggered*"
Liberal mask fetishists love to share this, which shows their lack of understanding. Many Americans who don't want to wear masks don't want to not because it is hard, but because it clashes with other principles
One might as well mock feminists with a similar comic:
White woman with pink pussy hat and "get your rosaries off my ovaries" shirt: "Women's rights! Women are equal to men! Men must stop oppressing women!"
Offscreen person: "Biological males shouldn't be allowed to compete in women's sports"
White woman: *triggered*
YouTube banned a DeSantis panel discussion because it contained Oxford, Harvard, and Stanford medical experts saying children don't need to wear masks - "The video, which was removed on Wednesday, was of a recent roundtable discussion DeSantis moderated on the global response to the pandemic. DeSantis was joined by Oxford epidemiologist Dr. Sunetra Gupta, Harvard professor Dr. Martin Kulldorff, and Dr. Scott Atlas and Dr. Jay Bhattacharya from Stanford University...
Notice that in the video it was medical experts questioning whether or not children needed to wear masks to slow the spread of Rona. Specifically, "Oxford epidemiologist Dr. Sunetra Gupta, Harvard professor Dr. Martin Kulldorff, and Dr. Scott Atlas and Dr. Jay Bhattacharya from Stanford University." Google says nope, those are the wrong kind of medical experts. Those ones don't count. Only our kind of medical experts, thank you very much...
DeSantis at one point in the video asked if it was necessary for kids to wear masks in school. Dr. Kulldorff in response said "children should not wear face masks, no. They don't need it for their own protection and they don't need it for protecting other people, either."
Dr. Bhattacharya said it is "developmentally inappropriate" for children to wear masks and that it "just doesn't help on the disease spread." He added: "I think it's absolutely not the right thing to do… if we went back a year, a lot of experts would say that wearing masks for the general public is not evidence-based."
Dr. Atlas later said "there's no scientific rationale or logic to have children wear masks in schools.""
Opinion | On Masks and Clinical Trials, Rand Paul’s Tweeting Is Just Plain Wrong - The New York Times - "Scientists know masks limit the coronavirus’s spread, but it’s impossible for randomized trials to prove that."
It's weird how the writer, credited as an associate professor, is unaware of the RCTs showing that masks don't work as source control. But she's an associate professor of sociology, so. Strangely, this wasn't disclosed as it was in a previous op-ed of hers
New Study on Texas Reopening Puts the Nail in the Coffin of Fauci's Credibility - "Two and a half months ago, when Texas Governor Greg Abbott axed the state’s mask mandate and other COVID-related restrictions on businesses and people, Joe Biden called the move a “huge mistake” and “Neanderthal thinking.” Dr. Anthony Fauci, who advises Biden, called it “risky” and “potentially dangerous.” Both were proven wrong when weeks later Texas experienced no surge in cases. A dumbfounded Fauci refused to admit he was wrong and claimed that a spike in cases and deaths would show up as a lagging indicator. But, no spike came. And last Sunday, Texas recorded zero COVID deaths for the first time since the pandemic. While it’s clear that both Biden and Fauci have been proven wrong already, a new study has found, definitively, that there was no connection between the lifted mandates and people being infected by or dying from COVID-19. The study, conducted by Bentley University economist Dhaval Dave, San Diego State University economist Joseph Sabia, and San Diego State University graduate research fellow Samuel Safford, used smartphone mobility data from SafeGraph and cases and deaths data compiled by The New York Times to analyze how the virus affected Texas before and after COVID restrictions were lifted on March 10. “We find no evidence that the Texas reopening led to substantial changes in social mobility, including foot traffic at a wide set of business establishments in Texas,” the report says. “We find no evidence that the Texas reopening affected the rate of new COVID-19 cases during the five weeks following the reopening.” There was also no difference between urban and suburban areas, or Trump counties and Biden counties—which is particularly interesting considering Trump supporters have shown to be less inclined to adhere to mask mandates and other social distancing requirements."
Face masks should continue forever, says Sage scientist - "Professor Susan Michie on Thursday suggested the measures introduced to tackle the coronavirus pandemic should be retained to help suppress other viruses and boost public health."
Another example of the "myth" of the slippery slope. How far we've come since "two weeks to flatten the curve"
Exclusive: People who wore masks were less likely to get sick
Given that even mask fetishists say masks are to protect others, not yourselves, this further points to the role of confounding factors in the literature supposedly showing that masks work
Sabrina Maddeaux: Chrystia Freeland needs to take her mask off and keep her shoes on - " Images of finance minister Chrystia Freeland mingling barefoot at the G7 summit weren’t her first fashion woopsie this weekend. She was also the only G7 finance minister to wear a mask in an official photo of the group taken outdoors, where everyone was safely distanced and mostly vaccinated. A mask she wasn’t wearing for safety’s sake, but for PR value... Freeland was captured barefaced just moments before the camera clicked, putting on her mask solely for the photo opp. While it’s unlikely this act of showmanship will convince any anti-maskers to change their tune, its phoniness will provide fodder for those prone to conspiracy theories and COVID denialism... The Trudeau government has always understood fashion as a powerful political tool; unfortunately their frequent missteps in the realm convey an image of clownishness rather than competence. At least it’s an accurate one. This is a government well practiced in putting on a show for voters, then flubbing things up when it comes to actual policy and action. While Liberal leaders claim to support truth and reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, they continue to fight residential school survivors in court. While they call themselves feminists, they downplay and dodge accountability on a sexual misconduct crisis in the military. Liberals campaign on electoral reform, but change their mind when it might mean more votes for other parties. They talk about freedom of speech, then run one of the more secretive governments in Canadian history and table a bill to control it on the internet. Now, Freeland has brought Canada’s lack of seriousness to the international stage. What must other G7 finance ministers think when she dons a mask solely for a press photo? I doubt it inspired a sense of trust or air of authenticity around the Canadian delegation, especially one that already has a history of appearing “flaky” and superficial to other world leaders."
MIT Researchers Admit Anti-Maskers Are More Scientifically Rigorous - "In their paper, “Viral Visualizations: How Coronavirus Skeptics Use Orthodox Data Practices to Promote Unorthodox Science Online,” the academics show some curious cognitive dissonance, making anti-mask proponents out to be clever propagandists who create easily understandable charts and graphs to sway the public away from the authoritative opinions of experts. At the same time the academics admit, almost in a puzzled fashion, that these “anti-maskers” do their investigations in a very scientific manner. “Indeed,” the paper claims, “anti-maskers often reveal themselves to be more sophisticated in their understanding of how scientific knowledge is socially constructed than their ideological adversaries, who espouse naive realism about the ‘objective’ truth of public health data.” The MIT academics go on to admit that those opposed to masks are not afraid to get down and dirty in looking at statistics, nor are they afraid to increasingly question the media and government authorities, a trait MIT researchers call “a weaponization of critical thinking.” Even more surprising is the revelation that anti-maskers’ “approach to the pandemic is grounded in a more scientific rigor, not less.”"
MIT Researchers Shocked to Find Anti-Mask Proponents Seek Data, Do Their Own Homework, and See Science As a Process - "To a rational person, this all sounds like the researchers stumbled upon a group of people genuinely interested in evaluating all of the information they could find in an emerging situation. Many mitigation measures were determined locally and being able to have informed discussions about various topics with members of local communities was important. It almost seems like they think this is commendable and defensible. Well, you would be wrong... There are also references to the Tea Party and racial resentment. They also lament “the skeptical impulse that the ‘science simply isn’t settled,’ prompting people to simply ‘think for themselves to horrifying ends.'” So, despite rigor, open debate, discussion, and even patience in explaining when other network members did not understand, skeptics are the problem, according to MIT. They also could not resist making it political and taking aim at the political right using their own biased and incorrect assumptions. It is not clear to me that any of the network leaders they identified are on the right. In fact, Berenson has said he is not. Then you look at the MIT researchers’ bios and find one professor of Anthropology, one junior faculty member, one graduate student, one undergraduate, and a high schooler. They have been steeped in an academic culture that discourages dissent and worships experts. Four out of five have not even lived long enough to have a comparable crisis to compare the COVID-19 pandemic. In all likelihood, the MIT students have no idea how different this crisis has been handled compared to others... As the researchers noted, “Most fundamentally, the groups we studied believe that science is a process, and not an institution.” The problem with that statement is they think it is something the anti-mask network believes. Science is a process. The fact that these young academics do not think so demonstrates the corruption and failure of the education system. If these are the future “experts” at MIT, the idea that they find skepticism troubling is terrifying for the future of science and the nation."
BREAKING: Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot busted partying maskless after declaring she will continue to wear masks - "it appeared that the party was celebrating Lightfoot's inauguration. No one was seen wearing masks... Lightfoot at the beginning of the week said she refuses to unmask despite new guidance issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC told the public that masks are not required for vaccinated individuals. The Chicago mayor maintained said that she'll stay woke regardless of science-based guidance"
If you view masks as a virtue signalling shibboleth, this isn't perplexing
Fauci admits to wearing a mask indoors because of appearances, not science - "Sen. Rand Paul questioned Dr. Fauci recently on the necessity of masking after recovering from natural infection or vaccination. "Given that no scientific studies have shown significant numbers of reinfections of patients previously infected or previously vaccinated, what specific studies do you cite to argue that the public should be wearing masks well into 2022?""
Certified Balloonhead Mika Brzezinski Now Says In Order To "Follow The Science" You Need To Contradict The CDC And Keep Wearing Masks Sometimes Even If Vaccinated - "MSNBC Co-Host of Morning Joe, Mika Brzezinski went on television this morning and decided to spew some of her own brand of anti-science, anti-vaccine misinformation, claiming she somehow now knows better than the CDC... The left are going to continue to cling to their masks, not because they "believe the science," but because it is their way of showing everyone that they are more righteous, more morally upright, more intelligent than the rest of us."
Thread by @ggreenwald on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "For the last year, anyone questioning let alone rejecting CDC/WHO guidance on COVID was vilified as an anti-science crank, to the point of being censored off the internet. Yet it's now totally common for liberals with no scientific training to go on TV & reject new CDC guidance.
All "consensus" should be subject to questioning and dispute. There's nothing wrong with doing it. But for most of the COVID pandemic, it wasn't allowed - certainly not culturally, and often at all. It's only allowed now that liberals don't like the new CDC guidance on masks. If someone like @morningmika or @maddow or whoever wants to keep wearing masks, that is their right. I have no interest in critiquing that choice. But if you go on TV and keep defending that choice, it is 100% an anti-vax message: you don't believe the vaccine really works.
Here's Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy defending his decision to contravene CDC guidance by keeping New Jersey's mask mandate in place even for fully vaccinated people. Just two months ago, governors who refused to obey CDC guidance were vilified"
CDC says we can take off our masks. Why some people aren't ready - "At the start of the pandemic, with so many unknowns, it seemed we couldn't even control whether we contracted the virus. Then experts began recommending masks. Finally, we had agency... Nearly half of Americans say they feel uneasy thinking about in-person interaction once the pandemic ends, according to the American Psychological Association's 2021 Stress in America report. And Sheriece Sadberry, a psychologist, says masks have served as a "natural barrier" for unwanted social encounters... Research shows after the pandemic ends, there could be a rise in mental health conditions such as agoraphobia – an "irrational fear of being in open or unfamiliar places, resulting in the avoidance of public situations" – and obsessive-compulsive disorder – "characterized by recurrent intrusive thoughts (obsessions) that prompt the performance of neutralizing rituals (compulsions).""
Even With The No-Mask Guidance, Some Pockets Of The U.S. Aren't Ready To Let Go - "In Seattle, masking still tends to be ubiquitous, even outdoors, where the CDC has previously said the risks are very low and does not require people to wear masks in most cases."
They’re Vaccinated and Keeping Their Masks On, Maybe Forever - The New York Times - "Whenever Joe Glickman heads out for groceries, he places an N95 mask over his face and tugs a cloth mask on top of it. He then pulls on a pair of goggles. He has used this safety protocol for the past 14 months. It did not change after he contracted the coronavirus last November. It didn’t budge when, earlier this month, he became fully vaccinated. And even though President Biden said on Thursday that fully vaccinated people do not have to wear a mask, Mr. Glickman said he planned to stay the course. In fact, he said, he plans to do his grocery run double-masked and goggled for at least the next five years... For a number of so-called perma-maskers, the decision is informed by trauma: They endured the coronavirus or witnessed loved ones die, and they say taking off their mask makes them feel terrifyingly vulnerable... Ms. Cohen, the schoolteacher, also said she recognized possible downsides: “At first, I thought, ‘This is great, I’m never going to get sick again!’” she said, of her plan to wear a mask to teach kindergarten going forward. “Then I realized when I’m trying to teach vowels they can’t see my mouth.” A few say they’ve been surprised to find that they’ve grown to enjoy being hidden behind a mask, expressionless and anonymous. “As a woman, we feel like we have to, when we go out in public, put on a little bit of makeup, eyeliner, blush,” said Keela Samis, 57, an attorney from St. Petersburg, Fla., who is vaccinated and does not plan to stop wearing a mask. “With a mask I don’t have to. It simplified my life.” Ms. Samis added: “Even if I’m the only person on planet Earth that continues to wear the mask, if that’s what makes me feel comfortable, I’ll wear the mask.”"
Considering we are told masks are to protect others, not yourself, this points to a fulfilment of deeper psychological needs
AOC, Lori Lightfoot REFUSE to take off masks despite new CDC guidance - "This isn't just a personal choice for Lightfoot. She intends to "encourage others" to flout CDC guidance and "wear a mask in public" just in case... Perhaps AOC and Lori Lightfoot are exactly the type of sensitive, fearful people who want to stay masked not because medical science tells them to, but because they just feel better that way."
‘Time To Push Back’: Track Coach Fired After Not Enforcing School’s ‘Senseless’ Outdoor Mask Mandate - "Bradley Keyes, who coached at Pembroke Academy in Pembroke, New Hampshire, for four years, explained his rationale in a letter to the school’s athletics director"
Teacher screams at unmasked vaccinated student: 'I don't want to get sick and die' - "A Wisconsin high school teacher is on administrative leave after video showing her standing over an unmasked student, screaming at him and insulting him, began circulating on the internet."
Matt Walsh on Twitter - "The morbidly obese teacher is worried that a vaccinated teenager will make her “get sick and die.” He poses literally no threat to her. Her own diet will kill her. In the meantime, she shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near a school ever again.
Some aren't ready to give up masks despite new CDC guidance - "When will she feel it's safe enough to ease up? "I don't know. Never," said Mitchell. "It's going to be really difficult for me.""
Covid: Cloth face masks during exercise limit performance and physical capacity, study finds - "Masked joggers said they felt claustrophobic during higher-intensity exercise and their oxygen intake was reduced, according to research. Heart rate was found to have a lower peak while exercising with a mask and participants could not keep up a jog for as long as when unmasked. The results of the small clinical trial were published online in the British Journal of Sports Medicine (BJSM)... Trish Greenhalgh, professor in primary care health sciences at the University of Oxford, was accused by a Public Health Engalnd expert of “whipping up hysteria” for saying on Good Morning Britain there can be a “danger” for pedestrians when a “puffing, panting” jogger runs past them... On average, participants managed to run for 1 minute 39 seconds (14 per cent) longer while unmasked."
I remember all the medical professionals making videos claiming that masks didn't affect anything. Too bad they never learnt that the plural of anecdote is not data
Fauci 'not sure' why Texas doesn't have COVID uptick after nixing masks
New mask guidelines fail to consider the immune-compromised. - "A strong democratic society should seek to protect its most vulnerable. And that protection shouldn’t mean relegating us to our homes forever or forcing us to live our lives inside a bubble"
By this logic, we must have lockdowns and mask wearing forevermore, forcing the whole of society to change forever ust to "protect" a "minority""
Oregon county drops mask exemption for POC after 'horrific racism' - "The region of 50,000 on a quiet part of the Oregon Coast became a target of anger after passing a directive that all residents wear masks indoors and outdoors — with a few exceptions, including for “people of color worried about racial profiling and harassment due to wearing face coverings in public.”... "We included the protections for those within our communities of color who historically, and often personally, found themselves the victims of harassment and violence," the Lincoln County Board of Commissioners and County Management team said in a statement Wednesday evening. "We are shocked and appalled at the volume of horrifically racist commentary we have received regarding this policy exemption."... Other Oregon counties say people of color are exempt from wearing masks but says that racial discrimination is illegal and will not be tolerated."
I like how criticising racism is labelled racism, or how it's ok to kill grandma if you're not white
Kids Don't Need Masks Outside - The Atlantic - "for most young people, the social and emotional benefits of taking masks off outside greatly outweigh the personal and public-health advantages of keeping them on. Unmasking kids outside, getting them moving, and reconnecting them with their friends is the evidence-based path toward restoring their health and well-being... After a year of terrifying headlines about kids having protracted symptoms, known as “long COVID,” or multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS-C), it turns out that the prevalence of long COVID in kids is low and the risk of contracting MIS-C is tiny. (MIS-C is also treatable.) In fact, children and young adults remain at low risk for COVID-19 overall. A little perspective is in order. According to the CDC, COVID-19 had killed 490 kids under the age of 18 as of May 10—fewer kids than die during a bad flu season. For example, the flu killed approximately 643 kids under the age of 18 during the 2017–18 flu season, and that’s despite widespread vaccination against the flu. The death of any child is tragic. But we don’t close down our lives for the flu, and we don’t mask up our kids—inside or out—during flu season. Instead, we send our kids to school, camp, day care, activities, and social gatherings. As the Johns Hopkins University epidemiologist Jennifer Nuzzo recently told The New York Times, “I can accept the risks of my kids getting COVID, in part because I compare it to the risk of getting other infectious diseases and the risk seems very, very small. I feel that if my kids were to get COVID, they would be okay. I also see the direct harms of their not having a normal life.”... People under the age of 20 may be half as susceptible to infection as people over the age of 20, and they are at least one-third less likely to spread the virus to others. The evidence at this point is overwhelming: Kids don’t appear to get COVID-19 as much as adults do, they generally don’t get that sick if they do get COVID-19, and they don’t transmit the virus to others as much as adults do... All of this research points to the conclusion that if you let your kids go unmasked outdoors, you’re not putting them or your community at significant risk. The risk is not zero, but then again, the risk of excessive caution is not zero either."
Liberal ideology is more important than Science
Addendum: Also published as "I Tell My Patients Not to Mask Their Kids Outside". Of course liberals hate the science on outdoor transmission being negligible, since it interferes with their virtue signalling
Joy Reid Said Vaccinated People Who Refuse To Wear Masks Are ‘Irrational.’ Fauci Didn’t Correct Her. - "outdoor post-vaccination masking is essentially a performative act. Those who no longer participate in this performance are opting out of irrational paranoia, not succumbing to it."
Oregon seeks to keep COVID mask mandate 'indefinitely'
They decided not to do that in the end, but the fact that this was being floated...
Covid-19 outbreak in South Korea Starbucks cafe spared employees who wore masks - "After a woman with the coronavirus visited a Starbucks cafe north of Seoul this month, more than two dozen patrons tested positive days later. But the four face mask-wearing employees escaped infection."
Given that we are told that "The Science" tells us that masks prevent transmission to others, not infection of yourself, this just shows that it's other factors responsible, e.g. interaction time in close proximity
I won't visit Spain until it ditches its idiotic outdoor mask rules - "Spain’s own mask obsession doesn’t appear to have made the blindest bit of difference to its Covid statistics. It was one of the earliest European embracers, mandating face coverings both indoors and outside in May 2020, and compliance is almost total, yet it has one of the worst Covid fatality rates in the world."
It's amazing that these rules stayed for 3 months
Spirit Airlines Kicks Autistic Boy Off Flight For Not Wearing Mask: VIDEO - "Arkansas mom Callie Kimball said she is aware of the dangerous consequences of contracting the viral pathogen and expressed people should take proper health precautions. However, she explained it was detrimental for her son Carter to wear a mask due to his disability... "He had a medical note from his physician stating that he's exempt from wearing masks, because whenever he wears a mask he holds his breath, or he starts freaking out and he will harm himself."... The spokesperson for Spirit Airlines added: "Our existing policy does not provide for medical exemptions, regardless of diagnosis.""
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon apologises for removing mask at wake - "The Scottish Sun has published a photograph of Nicola Sturgeon standing talking to three people at a social distance, but with her face uncovered. She was attending a wake after the funeral of a Scottish Government civil servant who died with Covid-19. Ms Sturgeon had been wearing a tartan mask and is said to have taken it off briefly as she was leaving the venue. She was photographed leaning on a chair chatting to three elderly ladies having removed her mask. The Scottish government’s coronavirus regulations say that customers in hospitality venues must wear a face covering except when seated – including when they are entering, exiting and moving around."
Hospital CEO says he had Covid and doesn't need a mask. His staff are appalled. - "Sanford Health... CEO and President Kelby Krabbenhoft addressed the health system's 50,000 employees, explaining his decision"
Yet now you can go without if you've been vaccinated
Face masks make you stupid - "They make you suggestible; they make you more likely to follow someone else’s direction and do things you wouldn’t otherwise do. In short, they switch off your executive function – your conscience. A great example comes from a study by Mathes and Guest (1976), who asked participants how willing they would be, and how much they would have to be paid, to carry a sign around the university cafeteria reading “masturbation is fun” (this being 1976, doing such a thing would be considered embarrassing; these days it will probably earn you a course credit!). The results showed that when people wore a mask, they were more likely to carry the sign and required less money to do so ($30 compared to $48, on average). Meanwhile, Miller and Rowold (1979) presented Halloween trick-or-treaters with a bowl of chocolates and told them they were allowed to take only two each. When the children thought they weren’t being watched, they helped themselves. Children without a mask broke the rule, taking more chocolates, 37% of the time, compared to 62% for masked children. The authors concluded that masks “lead to lower restraints on behaviour”. The effect has similarly been found online: the online disinhibition effect refers to the tendency for people to act antisocially when anonymous online (Suler, 2004). There is even an infamous trolling movement calling itself Anonymous and using a mask as its symbol. The disinhibiting effects of wearing a mask are described by psychologists in terms of a suspension of the superego’s control mechanisms, allowing subconscious impulses to take over. Saigre (1989) wrote that masks ‘short-cut’ conscious defence systems and encourage “massive regression” to a more primitive state; Castle (1986) wrote that eighteenth century masquerades allowed mask-wearers to release their repressed hedonistic and sexual impulses; and Caillois (1962) similarly wrote about European masked carnivals involving libidinal activities including “indecencies, jostling, provocative laughter, exposed breasts, mimicking buffoonery, a permanent incitement to riot, feasting and excessive talk, noise and movement”. In the 12th Century, Pope Innocent III banned masks as part of his fight against immorality; and in 1845, New York State made it illegal for more than two people to wear masks in public, after farmers wore masks to attack their landlords. From a neuroimaging perspective, masks are known to inhibit identity and impulse control – both associated with executive function in the prefrontal cortex (e.g., Glannon, 2005; Tacikowski, Berger & Ehrsson, 2017). In other words, masks silence the Jiminy Cricket in the brain."
Face mask study shows neck gaiter may be worse than no covering at all - The Washington Post - "Update: Since this story ran, more research has been done on gaiter efficacy. You can read about those new studies by aerosol scientists, who have pushed back against the characterization that thin gaiters may be “worse than nothing,” here."
Re-Evaluating Mask Mandates Part I: Science Gives Way to the “Talisman” - "The WHO’s list of disadvantages, however, had grown significantly and now also included potential headaches, facial skin problems, difficulties communicating, discomfort, improper mask disposal, poor compliance among young children and difficulties for people with developmental challenges, with chronic respiratory problems or those living in hot and humid conditions. Nor should this have been surprising either, for as we shall see it too was consistent with longstanding scientific understanding. None of these mask-associated risks, however, received a thorough airing in news and social media. On the contrary, many governments imposed even more stringent and often duplicative requirements, like requiring masks and distancing even outdoors where ventilation was good, or masks and plexiglass barriers, or masks, face shields and distancing. Masks, meanwhile, took on novel roles as political statements or articles of faith employed by political leaders, organizations, public health figures and much of the population. People were even seen swimming with paper masks. Physician Margaret Harris, a member of the WHO’s coronavirus response team, was quoted in an NPR column saying that “the mask is almost like a talisman,” making “people feel more secure and protected.” An official scientist appeared to say that mask-wearing was no longer about science, but about sorcery and emotion. Meanwhile, no one in the public sphere seemed willing to peruse the WHO’s December 2020 guideline in detail. Had they done so, they might have noticed two statements eerie in their juxtaposition. First, the WHO clearly recognized the serious limitations of the studies it cited about the efficacy of masking to reduce viral spread: “[The] studies differed in setting, data sources and statistical methods and have important limitations to consider notably the lack of information about actual exposure risk among individuals, adherence to mask wearing and the enforcement of other preventive measures.” Second, the WHO nonetheless insisted on universal mask usage... The take-home message from the above research appears unequivocal: masks work. The factual conclusion provides scientific support for the political decision to impose a public mask mandate. But for one fact: nearly all Covid-19-related epidemiological studies are either observational analyses (such as this or this), simulation studies (such as this), or a combination thereof (like the Canadian study described above). Almost none involved randomized controlled trials (RCTs)... it is reasonable to ask whether the detected reduction in Covid-19 transmission was caused by mask wearing. Could it not have been due to other preventative health measures adopted around the same time, such as improved hand hygiene, limited social interaction, physical distancing in public settings or even individuals’ general health regimen? And what about the impact of other variables such as age or race on the risk of catching the virus? Finally, could there be other, as-yet overlooked confounders that affect virus spread? Randomization is required to negate the effects of the confounding variables, known or unknown. Because of these known limitations of observational studies, the RCT is recognized as the gold standard of clinical research practice, a rigorous tool of cause-and-effect analysis. One of the world’s leading experts in medical standards and statistics, Dr. Janus Christian Jakobsen, who is frequently cited for her systematic reviews of meta analyses, authoritatively stated: “Clinical experience or observational studies should never be used as the sole basis for assessment of intervention effects – randomized clinical trials are always needed…Observational studies should primarily be used for quality control after treatments are included in clinical practice.”... with respect to influenza, five out of six RCTs conducted in healthcare settings found no significant difference between mask-wearing and control groups. Even more important from the standpoint of the current pandemic, none of four RCTs performed in broader community settings found a significant difference between masking and remaining bare-faced. For influenza-like illnesses, the pooled data from five other RCTs as well showed a non-significant protective effect of mask wearing for avoiding either primary or secondary infection."
Re-Evaluating Mask Mandates Part II: Exposing the “Assumption-Led Claim” - "a large Danish study, approved by an ethics committee and published in March 2021 in Annals of Internal Medicine. It tracked over 6,000 participants across the country, divided roughly equally between people who wore surgical masks and those who did not, from April to June 2020. Universal mask wearing was not yet recommended by the Danish authorities and mask use remained generally uncommon, thereby avoiding ethical concerns that otherwise might have been raised by the need to persuade a control group not to wear masks, and freeing the study results from the impact of governmental regulation. Another strength is that this study used not only the results of the common PCR test as its primary outcome to measure infection results, but also the participant’s antibody count, an arguably more reliable measure than nasal swab sampling. Importantly, all participants spent at least three hours per day outside their homes, i.e., were not isolated from social interaction with potentially infected individuals. As with previous RCTs testing the efficacy of facemasks against influenza virus (discussed in Part I), the Danish scientific team found no statistically significant difference in the spread of SARS-CoV-2 between the experimental and control groups... The other RCT is a micro study performed in a laboratory setting. It used four participants whose saliva, captured on a petri dish, was analyzed following exposure to the virus. It found nodifference in the median viral emission between the mask-free individuals and the mask wearers. That study, however, was ultimately retracted after the researchers admitted they had misinterpreted part of their findings but were, rather strangely, denied the customary opportunity to correct and update their paper... the Covid-19 crisis has generated literally tens of thousands of scientific papers on nearly all aspects of the disease in question. This should certainly appear to justify more than two RCTs evaluating the efficacy of one of the most heavily relied-upon, onerous and contentious public health measures. The fact that this has not been done is a matter of considerable curiosity, to say the least... The new literature review of April 2021 is devastating to the common view of masking as all-benefit, no-risk. Prepared by eight German scientists, it includes 31 RCTs and 13 observational studies, was published by the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health and is entitled Is a Mask That Covers the Mouth and Nose Free from Undesirable Side Effects in Everyday Use and Free of Potential Hazards? Notably, the review provided quantitative evaluation of all types of masks including unregulated cloth masks. It reports undesired side effects across no fewer than 14 medical disciplines, including neurology, psychology, sports medicine, pediatrics and microbiology. The review leaves very little room for doubt that prolonged mask wearing by the general public can be unsafe. In fact, it is claimed to lead to “psychological and physical deterioration” with a “negative effect on the basis of all aerobic life, external and internal respiration, with an influence on a wide variety of organ systems and metabolic processes with physical, psychological and social consequences for the individual human being.” The overarching negative consequences of mask wearing include an increase in dead space volume (by 80 percent in one study), a reduction in the user’s blood oxygen levels, a 30-fold increase in carbon dioxide retention and greater average breathing resistance (by 128 percent) due to excessive moisturization of masks... The review states: “Even slightly but persistently increased heart rates encourage oxidative stress with endothelial dysfunction, via increased inflammatory messengers, and finally, the stimulation of arteriosclerosis of the blood vessels has been proven.” This summary of the previous findings is distressing enough, yet is not exhaustive. The initial physiological effects of mask wearing are also recognized to lead to non-physical consequences, including the impairment of the wearer’s brain function. The view that wearing a mask, especially for a long period of time, quite simply compromises one’s ability to think is among the review’s most firmly stated conclusions... Dissenting scientific voices were silenced and even cancelled by their peers. Among those are Denis Rancourt, a former tenured Full Professor of Physics at the University of Ottawa. The prolific researcher had amassed a publication record of over 100 papers in leading peer-reviewed journals in physics, chemistry, geology, materials science, soil science and environmental science. Rancourt’s scientific “h-index” of 39 placed him just one point short of the international rating for “outstanding scientist” in the Nobel Prize category. But all of that would count for nothing once Rancourt concluded that the orthodoxy on masking was wrong. In April 2020, Rancourt wrote Masks Don’t Work: A Review of Science Relevant to Covid-19 Social Policy. The article was published by ResearchGate, a popular networking site for academics, gathering an unprecedented 400,000 reads – but was later taken down. Since then Rancourt has written another dozen articles opposing the general narrative around the Covid-19 virus and pandemic while ResearchGate has all-but erased his existence, leaving only the remnants of his publicly presented lab on its website and moving his original profile into “archives.”... wearing masks may actually increase the risk of catching other diseases. The surfaces and interior fibres of warm and humid masks provide an ideal environment for the accumulation of germs. As was shown in the reviewed experimental studies, after only two hours of wearing masks the pathogen density can increase ten-fold and after six hours the following viruses can be detected: adenovirus, bocavirus, respiratory syncytial virus and influenza viruses. And these are consequences observed in medical personnel who are conscious of avoiding self-contamination"
There is some talk about masks protecting you by reducing viral intake, but the RCT suggests otherwise
Comprehensive analysis of 50 states shows greater spread with mask mandates - "Proponents of the mask mandate might suggest that mask mandates were often imposed once cases already spread quickly, so there is a negative bias of increased cases in those areas (or times) that had mandates in place. However, there was no evidence of any reduction in cases or even better outcomes many weeks later. In fact, Ian Miller, one of the researchers at RationalGround.com, found that three counties in Florida (Manatee, Martin, and Nassau) that allowed the mandate to expire after having implemented it had fewer cases per capita than those counties that kept the mandate. Nor has the mandate worked in states where it was implemented long before the surge in cases began."
This corrects for at least some endogeneity (mask mandates being imposed by counties with a worse covid situation) since with the Florida counties, new case counts were similar when 3 removed their mandates. The fact that states with different mandates followed a similar case curve is also telling. The study also controlled for population density and compliance