Homemade masks are quite obviously a stopgap until better materials are in place. It feels pretty clear that the original comment was meant to say people should take responsibility for preventing themselves from becoming a vector.
The goal of wearing masks is to stop people from spreading their germs, effectiveuly bringing down the R0 value of the virus, slowing the spread, flattening the curve.
The real challenge is that we need about 80% of people to wear masks to really put a dent in things. Really, everyone should be advocating for everyone they know to wear a mask.
See this site for research backed info if you are not convinced: https://www.fast.ai/2020/04/20/skeptics-masks/
"an those speaking about face coverings & #COVID19 please read @trishgreenhalgh evidence review. We are talking about CLOTH FACE COVERINGS not surgical masks Coronavirus IS NOT influenza - coverings work better People spread when talking, NOT JUST COUGHING & when PRESYMPTOMATIC"
I'm so happy to see the progress being made on this issue. 11 out of 12 of the largest countries by GDP now recommend public mask wearing (the other is UK, which is about to change their guidance.)
Question, did you happen to just stumble upon this thread? Or were you using some type of notification service and alerted about it?
Way back a couple of jobs before I worked with Jeremy at Fastmail we used to talk about "slashdot distance", as in "I don't read Slashdot, I just read summaries". "I don't even read summaries, I just have friends tell me if there's anything interesting in the summaries"... etc.