I was reasonable when COVID came out. I masked up and encouraged others to mask up. The virus was new, there was much we didn’t know, and there was a lot of data that showed if an infected person put on a mask, it could help at the margins to reduce the spread of COVID. At a time hospitals were filling up, we needed to improve the margins. It should be noted that part of the issue as well was we discovered asymptomatic people could spread COVID and not know they were infected. So if everybody put on a mask, we could reduce the numbers to keep hospitals overflowing.
Mama Mia! Can we please stop with COVID? I am over being locked down/up, masked, warned to mask or not, etc. Can't believe a dang thing. What I do know is that the CDC has ceased to have any credibility now! I am so grateful to have had the vaccine in early January. Both my husband and I remember lining up the the late 50's for the Polio vaccine and all the kids who had to go on iron lungs. If I have options to shop, eat, play, etc. where a mask is not required, that's where I am going. I don't have options for on an air plane so I will mask up but forget the other stuff; getting up at 4 AM to shop the senior hours, etc. I'm done!
I know that death among the vaccinated is said to be rare. I am certain it is. But when rare happens to your next door neighbor, it get very very real.
Close the borders and letting a million criminals into our Country! The Covid Vaccinations are Experimental MRNA/DNA vaccines! Why do you think a lot of people testing positive w Covid have had all their vaccinations? Stop the Tyranny!
Wow, just imagine if all the resources, money, time and energy spent on a virus that has a 99%+ survival rate for healthy individuals were spent on heart disease, cancer, strokes, alzheimers, kidney disease, diabetes or any of the other top ten causes of death before c-19 virtually eliminated them as causes of death. Just damn.
We’ve had tens of thousands of infested illegals come into this country. In the dark of night or bright sunlight they packed into buses or trains on left on our doorsteps throughout our cities. Stop the insanity, stop the virus.
See the NIH Study on Droplets vs Aerosols (came out in Oct.). The Viral particles are mainly aerosols, because even the droplets shrink as they evaporate. The bottom line: N95 gives good protection. Cloth masks and Surgical masks don't give any meaningful protection and are not allowed on a covid ward. Aerosols are 1 mm in size - droplets are 40 mm or larger. Aerosols are like a child on a trike riding into a Double Garage. Velocity is reduced by the mask, but that means nothing to aerosols just floating around. See also the CDC 2015 mask study - the masks give little to no protection. All the following studies refer to "may" provide protection or have assumed % of protection. CDC Data: 340 children under the age of 18 have died in a year and a half. All had comorbidities prior to getting covid. Same 1.5 year time frame 52,000 died of all causes, Pneumonia alone (no covid) was more than double.
I am fully vaccinated, and still mask in public. Forget the statistics about your chances to get sick or die if you are fully vaccinated. The focus should be that you can still spread the virus. We all need to keep masking given the vaccine resistance among too many people. The virus will continue to spread and mutate as long as there are hosts where it can grow. I do not want to be one of those transmitting the virus to others. I hope government agencies, schools, hospitals, and businesses all start requiring their employees to get vaccinated. I applaud the small businesses who are refusing to serve unvaccinated people.
Erick - to me, you, like an N95, are 90% right. But, on this issue, we part. Mr. Tyrone said it best when he reminded all of us to simply love our neighbor without exception or bias. As Andy Stanley imparts: "What does love require of me?"
The numbers do speak for themselves. The bigger issue is trust. It is hard to get and easy to loose. The CDC had lost the trust of the American people. Not sure how to fix it even if it can be fixed. Let us hope an pray that another bad bug does not come around any time soon.
In response to this article, "Against Masking", I just reviewed the literature on the efficacy of masks. Previously, I had reviewed the actual physical science regarding the rate of micro-droplet transmission via different types of masks. The quality of the studies regarding mask wear in the community are uniformly poor and demonstrate no significant advantage to mask wearing in controlling COVID infections. In hospitals, the use of N95 masks, IF WORN CONTINUALLY AND NOT INTERMITTENTLY, i.e., for an entire 8-12 hour shift, are somewhat preventative. Even so, I know many doctors and nurses who wore these scrupulously in the hospital and still got sick. In the actual studies of micro-droplet transmission rates of different types of masks, the studies are compelling. N95 masks prevent over 90% of both incoming and outgoing transmission. All the other types are weak. The blue medical masks that many folks were are, at best, 50% efficient. In the hospital setting, these masks were pretty much worthless. The cloth masks are worse and the "I'm fixin' to rob a train" bandanna masks are laughably inefficient.
It is unfortunate that "masking" has become so politicized. The far left has a fundamentally totalitarian ethos wherein they think that they, the "smart people" should herd the rest of us sheep around. Forced masking is, in their view, a step in the right direction. Almost all public health workers share the view that we are all a herd that needs to be protected from disease- as a herd, not as a collection of individuals. This is not a criticism because, to some degree it is true. However the lefty pols have hijacked this as a way of forcing a sort of herd compliance to a behavior that has actually never been proven to impact this epidemic to any significant degree.
My message: get vaccinated! And, if you are a high risk individual, go to Lowes and buy a box of N95 masks and use them when you shop. $19.95 for a box of 5. You can use one for a total of 12 hours. That's a lot of trips to get groceries, hardware, etc. If you are not high risk...get vaccinated and live your life!
What type of mask and how do you use it? If COVID is on the surface of your mask, isn’t it also on your face and clothing? Stores did extra cleaning which is always good. People learned to wash their hands better and more frequently. How much of this helped and how much is theater?
“Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
"Republican leaders"? There's a contradiction in terms for you. (Or is it an Oxymoron? Considering we're talking Republicans, I'm leaning more towards oxy "moron")
The part you were leaving out here is children. God created us as social beings and our actions affect each other. Schools are about to start in Georgia and we're at the beginning of another steep wave. Louisiana just required masking. They are getting crushed by the Delta variant. I know COVID has generally affected children less, but watch these six short clips (5 minutes total; scroll down to watch the others) from Dr. Mark Kline, Physician-in-Chief at Children's Hospital New Orleans, a 244-bed children's hospital in the heart of the Delta outbreak https://twitter.com/Cleavon_MD/status/1422303133972242444. In short, he says there is not a single children's ICU bed in all of Louisiana. He also says half of the kids coming in with Delta are now perfectly healthy.
As a parent of five kids who are too young to get vaccinated, I sure would feel better if we were masking in schools. Parents now have to live with lots of stress as we worry about our kids getting sick because people are unvaccinated and leaders don't have the political will to require masks in schools.
Without the various bits of statistics, that is what I have been saying all along. Wear a mask if you want to. Get the shot if you want to. Stop masking kids. Stop lockdowns. And leave those of us who don't want to mask or get the shot, alone. I live in a place where there were no government mask mandates or lockdowns except the school for a time. Many of us never masked. We are fine.
Why is no one talking about what really made the difference, "Social Distancing?"
Seriously, for the unvaccinated there is almost no chance of getting covid if you stay away from other people and infected animals.
If you are an adult dealing with children under 12 on a regular basis, masks, properly worn by the adults, might make sense, particularly when flu season starts up again.
Mama Mia! Can we please stop with COVID? I am over being locked down/up, masked, warned to mask or not, etc. Can't believe a dang thing. What I do know is that the CDC has ceased to have any credibility now! I am so grateful to have had the vaccine in early January. Both my husband and I remember lining up the the late 50's for the Polio vaccine and all the kids who had to go on iron lungs. If I have options to shop, eat, play, etc. where a mask is not required, that's where I am going. I don't have options for on an air plane so I will mask up but forget the other stuff; getting up at 4 AM to shop the senior hours, etc. I'm done!
I know that death among the vaccinated is said to be rare. I am certain it is. But when rare happens to your next door neighbor, it get very very real.
Close the borders and letting a million criminals into our Country! The Covid Vaccinations are Experimental MRNA/DNA vaccines! Why do you think a lot of people testing positive w Covid have had all their vaccinations? Stop the Tyranny!
Wow, just imagine if all the resources, money, time and energy spent on a virus that has a 99%+ survival rate for healthy individuals were spent on heart disease, cancer, strokes, alzheimers, kidney disease, diabetes or any of the other top ten causes of death before c-19 virtually eliminated them as causes of death. Just damn.
Close the borders!!
We’ve had tens of thousands of infested illegals come into this country. In the dark of night or bright sunlight they packed into buses or trains on left on our doorsteps throughout our cities. Stop the insanity, stop the virus.
See the NIH Study on Droplets vs Aerosols (came out in Oct.). The Viral particles are mainly aerosols, because even the droplets shrink as they evaporate. The bottom line: N95 gives good protection. Cloth masks and Surgical masks don't give any meaningful protection and are not allowed on a covid ward. Aerosols are 1 mm in size - droplets are 40 mm or larger. Aerosols are like a child on a trike riding into a Double Garage. Velocity is reduced by the mask, but that means nothing to aerosols just floating around. See also the CDC 2015 mask study - the masks give little to no protection. All the following studies refer to "may" provide protection or have assumed % of protection. CDC Data: 340 children under the age of 18 have died in a year and a half. All had comorbidities prior to getting covid. Same 1.5 year time frame 52,000 died of all causes, Pneumonia alone (no covid) was more than double.
I am fully vaccinated, and still mask in public. Forget the statistics about your chances to get sick or die if you are fully vaccinated. The focus should be that you can still spread the virus. We all need to keep masking given the vaccine resistance among too many people. The virus will continue to spread and mutate as long as there are hosts where it can grow. I do not want to be one of those transmitting the virus to others. I hope government agencies, schools, hospitals, and businesses all start requiring their employees to get vaccinated. I applaud the small businesses who are refusing to serve unvaccinated people.
Erick - to me, you, like an N95, are 90% right. But, on this issue, we part. Mr. Tyrone said it best when he reminded all of us to simply love our neighbor without exception or bias. As Andy Stanley imparts: "What does love require of me?"
The numbers do speak for themselves. The bigger issue is trust. It is hard to get and easy to loose. The CDC had lost the trust of the American people. Not sure how to fix it even if it can be fixed. Let us hope an pray that another bad bug does not come around any time soon.
Thanks, again, Erick for your sage counsel!
In response to this article, "Against Masking", I just reviewed the literature on the efficacy of masks. Previously, I had reviewed the actual physical science regarding the rate of micro-droplet transmission via different types of masks. The quality of the studies regarding mask wear in the community are uniformly poor and demonstrate no significant advantage to mask wearing in controlling COVID infections. In hospitals, the use of N95 masks, IF WORN CONTINUALLY AND NOT INTERMITTENTLY, i.e., for an entire 8-12 hour shift, are somewhat preventative. Even so, I know many doctors and nurses who wore these scrupulously in the hospital and still got sick. In the actual studies of micro-droplet transmission rates of different types of masks, the studies are compelling. N95 masks prevent over 90% of both incoming and outgoing transmission. All the other types are weak. The blue medical masks that many folks were are, at best, 50% efficient. In the hospital setting, these masks were pretty much worthless. The cloth masks are worse and the "I'm fixin' to rob a train" bandanna masks are laughably inefficient.
It is unfortunate that "masking" has become so politicized. The far left has a fundamentally totalitarian ethos wherein they think that they, the "smart people" should herd the rest of us sheep around. Forced masking is, in their view, a step in the right direction. Almost all public health workers share the view that we are all a herd that needs to be protected from disease- as a herd, not as a collection of individuals. This is not a criticism because, to some degree it is true. However the lefty pols have hijacked this as a way of forcing a sort of herd compliance to a behavior that has actually never been proven to impact this epidemic to any significant degree.
My message: get vaccinated! And, if you are a high risk individual, go to Lowes and buy a box of N95 masks and use them when you shop. $19.95 for a box of 5. You can use one for a total of 12 hours. That's a lot of trips to get groceries, hardware, etc. If you are not high risk...get vaccinated and live your life!
Robert E. Johnson, MD FACS
What type of mask and how do you use it? If COVID is on the surface of your mask, isn’t it also on your face and clothing? Stores did extra cleaning which is always good. People learned to wash their hands better and more frequently. How much of this helped and how much is theater?
“Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
Matthew 22:37-39 NIV
"Republican leaders"? There's a contradiction in terms for you. (Or is it an Oxymoron? Considering we're talking Republicans, I'm leaning more towards oxy "moron")
The part you were leaving out here is children. God created us as social beings and our actions affect each other. Schools are about to start in Georgia and we're at the beginning of another steep wave. Louisiana just required masking. They are getting crushed by the Delta variant. I know COVID has generally affected children less, but watch these six short clips (5 minutes total; scroll down to watch the others) from Dr. Mark Kline, Physician-in-Chief at Children's Hospital New Orleans, a 244-bed children's hospital in the heart of the Delta outbreak https://twitter.com/Cleavon_MD/status/1422303133972242444. In short, he says there is not a single children's ICU bed in all of Louisiana. He also says half of the kids coming in with Delta are now perfectly healthy.
As a parent of five kids who are too young to get vaccinated, I sure would feel better if we were masking in schools. Parents now have to live with lots of stress as we worry about our kids getting sick because people are unvaccinated and leaders don't have the political will to require masks in schools.
Without the various bits of statistics, that is what I have been saying all along. Wear a mask if you want to. Get the shot if you want to. Stop masking kids. Stop lockdowns. And leave those of us who don't want to mask or get the shot, alone. I live in a place where there were no government mask mandates or lockdowns except the school for a time. Many of us never masked. We are fine.
Why is no one talking about what really made the difference, "Social Distancing?"
Seriously, for the unvaccinated there is almost no chance of getting covid if you stay away from other people and infected animals.
If you are an adult dealing with children under 12 on a regular basis, masks, properly worn by the adults, might make sense, particularly when flu season starts up again.