The Barbarian
Crabby Old White Guy
- Apr 3, 2003
- 26,253
- 11,449
- 76
- Country
- United States
- Faith
- Catholic
- Marital Status
- Married
- Politics
- US-Libertarian
There’s no real science, either.
Well, let's take a look. Over a year ago, scientists predicted the results we see in the comparison of states with and without mask mandates.
Respirology. 2020 Apr 30
Rationale for universal face masks in public against COVID‐19
Anthony Paulo Sunjaya, MD, SM 1 and Christine Jenkins, MD, AM, FRACP 1
...Weighing up all these considerations, there is modest evidence to support widespread community use of universal masking, which includes cloth masks to help reduce transmission of SARS‐CoV‐2. It will be important to examine evidence from countries such as China, Hong Kong and Singapore, where the majority of residents (as high as 98%) use masks in public, and where to a significant extent, COVID was contained in combination with known effective strategies.
The theoretical rationale discussed here suggests that along with evidence‐based recommendations such as physical distancing and maintaining hand hygiene, universal masking may help in reducing droplet‐based transmission of COVID and contribute to flattening and shortening the curve.
States with mask mandates had significantly lower infection rates as predicted. But also as predicted, masks were not completely effective. They were more effective in stopping influenza infections, which is consistent with the findings that the COVID-19 virus is more infectious than influenza. Which means that a smaller minimum infectious dose exists for COVID-19. And that would explain the significant reduction in infections for states with mask mandates, albeit not complete protection.
Which, as I wrote, is consistent with the predictions based on experimental results.
Upvote
0