Posted on by Californiacontrarian

Masks ?


FYI, I wear a mask in situations where I cannot social distance, for example in a store or in Costco. I do not wear one in situations where social distancing is not necessary, for example walking in my neighborhood or on the beach. I do not wear a mask in situations where social distancing is not an issue, for example when driving my car or when taking out the garbage. I wear a mask when the proprietor requests that I wear one, for example at the gym even though no one is within fifteen feet of me for longer than a second or two.

Suffice it to say, I am not convinced that masks are the end-all absolute answer, but for the sake of harmony I will wear one in situations where everyone else is wearing one . . . “when in Rome!” If I am not wearing a mask when I am out walking, and get taken to task by some Karen, I am ready with my response . . . “Karen, you of course know that wearing a mask is supposed to prevent me from spreading the virus to somebody else. Well, good news! I just got my Covid test back this morning, and I am negative. Thus, I have no virus to spread. Lucky you. Have a nice day.”

Seriously, is there any evidence that mask-wearing prevents the spread of infection? If there is, I am not aware of it. In the past few days I read two different articles on masks.

The first was in the Wall Street Journal by Joseph Ladapo M.D., an associate professor at UCLA’s School of Medicine. From his piece: “Several randomized trials of community or household masking have been completed. Most have shown that wearing a mask has little or no effect on respiratory virus transmission, according to a review published earlier this year in Emerging Infectious Diseases, a CDC Journal.”

Likewise, states with mask mandates had a 2% reduction in growth rates of Covid-19 compared to states without such mandates. Only a 2% difference implies that either people weren’t compliant, or that they do not make much of a difference.

Again from Dr. Ladapo, “Based on evidence around the world, it should be clear that masked mandates won’t extinguish the virus.”

Recently Senator Ron Paul M.D. tweeted:

To the scolds blaming ⁦@ realDonaldTrump infection on not wearing mask: the only published randomized clinical study of cloth masks shows 97% penetration of particles & higher infection rate than control. The discussion from that article, BMJ, 2015, says the following, concerning HCW (hospital workers):

“We have provided the first clinical efficacy data of cloth masks, which suggest HCWs should not use cloth masks as protection against respiratory infection. Cloth masks resulted in significantly higher rates of infection than medical masks, and also performed worse than the control arm. The controls were HCWs who observed standard practice, which involved mask use in the majority, albeit with lower compliance than in the intervention arms. The control HCWs also used medical masks more often than cloth masks. When we analysed all mask-wearers including controls, the higher risk of cloth masks was seen for laboratory-confirmed respiratory viral infection.”

On the other hand a physician on YouTube in Britain, Dr. John Campbell, thinks that mask wearing by an individual may decrease the inoculum that one receives from someone who has the virus. If this is true, it could mean that mask wearers are more likely to get a milder infection, and getting a milder infection would be a good thing. Again he is saying that mask-wearing does not prevent infection, but rather attenuates it.

Now that the election is over, it will be interesting to see if the compliance with mask wearing changes.

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