Masks don’t work Masks don’t work Masks don’t work Masks don’t work
Would I lie to you?
When will they learn, when will they ever learn?
During the pandemic, I have closely read the literature on masking, and in 2021, we published a 60 page working paper with 300 references that community masking doesn’t work. Our analysis included cloth, surgical and n95 masks— there was and is no evidence to justify any community recommendation for any mask. Especially for kids.
Recently, Cochrane validated this, and found no evidence to support masking adults. Yet, all these years, Anthony Fauci repeatedly went on TV, and falsely claimed masking works, including cloth masks—which demonstrably don’t work, contradicted by multiple randomized trials.
Now, on CNN, Fauci is challenged. Please watch this amazing 1 minute video. Fauci is directly confronted with the recent Cochrane review. Then consider his answer. . . .
But Cochrane Review, who they? Never heard of ’em!
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Indeed, they came up with a working paper that at the very least should lead to spirited discussion of the Masks Don’t Work matter, as elucidated in this opening paragraph:
Until April 2020, World Health Organization COVID-19 guidelines stated that “[c]loth (e.g. cotton or gauze) masks are not recommended under any circumstance,” 1 which were updated in June 2020 to state that “the widespread use of masks by healthy people in the community setting is not yet supported by high quality or direct scientific evidence.”2 In the surgical theater context, a Cochrane review found “no statistically significant difference in infection rates between the masked and unmasked group in any of the trials.”3 Another Cochrane review, of influenza-like-illness, found “low certainty evidence from nine trials (3507 participants) that wearing a mask may make little or no difference to the outcome of influenzalike illness (ILI) compared to not wearing a mask (risk ratio (RR) 0.99, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.82 to 1.18).”4
And believe me, your faithful servant in these and other matters, each footnote — here not linked unfortunately — leads where only fools would tread with a view to discrediting what’s said or implicated.
And in the next paragraph, here offered as further commentary on what gummints including our own led us to in The Great Misguided Over-reaction.
These observations may come as a surprise to those in countries, such as the United States, where government leaders, news media, and even public health officials have repeatedly asserted that the widespread use of masks will help to prevent transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes COVID-19. By September 2020, the U.S. federal government had distributed 600 million face masks for use by the public as part of the response to the pandemic.5,6 At the local level, 32 states and numerous 1 Advice on the Use of Masks [in] the Community, During Home Care and in Health Care Settings in the Context of the Novel Coronavirus (2019-Ncov) Outbreak: Interim Guidance, WORLD HEALTH ORG., Jan. 29, 2020, at 2, https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/330987 (last visited Sep. 5, 2021). 2 Advice on the Use of Masks in the Context of COVID-19: Interim Guidance, WORLD HEALTH ORG., June 5, 2020, at 6, https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/332293 (last visited Sep. 5, 2021). 3 Marina Vincent & Peggy Edwards, Disposable Surgical Face Masks for Preventing Surgical Wound Infection in Clean Surgery, 4 COCHRANE DATABASE SYS.REV. 1, 1 (2016). 4 Tom Jefferson et al., Physical Interventionsto Interrupt or Reduce the Spread of Respiratory Viruses (Review), 11 COCHRANE DATABASE SYS.REV. 1, 2 (2020). 5 Helen Branswell et al., The Trump Administration Haphazardly Gave Away Millions of Covid-19 Masks — To Schools, Broadcasters, and Large Corporations, STAT NEWS, Aug. 13, 2020, https://www.statnews.com/2020/08/13/the-trump-administration-haphazardly-gave-away-millions-of-masks-toschools-broadcasters-and-fortune-500-companies/. 3 municipalities implemented mask mandates,7,8 and calls for a nationwide mask mandate garnered significant attention.9 At the height of the pandemic, New York City instituted a $1000 fine for those who refuse to wear face masks in public,10 and prominent national leaders stated that “[w]earing masks is not a political statement, it is a scientific imperative.” 11 Over 40% of the global population lives in countries that mandate mask-wearing in public areas.12 As COVID-19 persists, community masking policies continue to be the subject of public health and public attention.
Read it, my friends. And weep. And hit the work paper links for the mini-links within the paragraphs.