Comment by pen2l | Hacker News Reader

Comment by pen2l | Hacker News Reader

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> Fauci did not argue against civilian masking solely based on shortages.

No, he did. You linked the same clip I linked, except minus the 20 seconds where he reveals his reasoning. Please refer to slightly longer version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRa6t_e7dgI

I agree it wasn't a great thing to play down masks to the extent he did, but as someone else pointed out, explaining the nuance of the situation to 350 million people is a tough task. Remember the toilet paper situation? Imagine if he'd sold masks as the solution, people would try to get their hands on one at all costs, they would not have faith in home-made cloth masks, they'd want what doctors are wearing because those are the ones that really work (is what they'd be saying)! Stories like these would be commonplace: https://www.dimsumdaily.hk/160-pieces-of-n95-surgical-masks-... I frankly don't know how else he could've handled this if at the time the information available to them indicated a possible shortage of masks. What would you have done in his place at that time in that situation? And coming back to my original point: doesn't Fauci deserve a pass on this one, considering how sticky the situation was?

Give me a few minutes to find a link on Kramer talking about Fauci

I saw the longer version, it ends with Fauci saying "that's the point." But he made several points, as did the Surgeon General. The policy guidance was not in favor of mandates for several reasons. I don't know how else to say this clearly.

It seems from a recent comment from somenone in Taiwan (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26139550) that masks were not mandated apart from trains and certain private settings until recently. There may be ancient inherited CoV partial immunity operating across much of Asia, people may be tidier and more careful, etc.

Masks are just one of several tools, with downside risks. From the Danish RCT and many others, they seem not significantly effective in general populations against respiratory viruses. Mandates, especially with such selective enforcement and hypocrisy in high places, plus overpaying and probably skimming a la Newsom, stink.

In saying "that's the point, it could lead to a shortage of masks for people who really need it" he's giving away his awareness of the need for masks, and the reason for why he at all suggested to avoid masks in the first place. That's to say he never had a change of mind about the effectiveness of masks.

Here are two links I could find in which Kramer talks nicely about Fauci: https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/a32688094/anthon... < As recently as March of this year, Kramer said of Fauci, “We are friends again. I’m feeling sorry for how he’s being treated. I emailed him this, but his one line answer was, ‘Hunker down.’” > & https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/27/health/larry-kramer-antho...

There should be a quote of him saying something to the effect of "Fauci is LGBT community's best friend" dated around 2015 but I'm unable to find a source for this at the time, I'll continue my search though and link when I find it.

The downside risks to mask-wearing are marginal next to its benefits. I'm reviewing Danish RCT and other papers you linked now.

I'll say one other thing: I think it was poor form on my part to steer this thread off and bring to view here before everyone something you'd said that I perceived to be bad. Because I think that goes against the principle of giving everyone the benefit of doubt, it goes against the principle of charitable interpretation and really it's bad form to unnecessarily remind folks of past wrongs (because indeed when we just _expect_ better of people, they come through most of the times, so one really ought to just forget old wrongs and be more forward-looking). For your part in being one of the initial designers of Rust, you deserve some leeway anyway. Crucially though, I in a way made the error I accused you of committing in slandering Fauci. For this, I am sorry.

Thanks for that last paragraph.

Regarding Danish study, here's what I found: the authors concluded that “the 95% confidence intervals are compatible with a possible 46% reduction to 23% increase in infections among mask wearers. These findings do offer evidence about the degree of protection mask wearers can anticipate in a setting where others are not wearing masks and where other public health measures, including social distancing, are in effect. The findings, however, should not be used to conclude that a recommendations for everyone to wear masks in the community would not be effective in reducing SARS-CoV-2 infections, because the trial did not test the role of masks in source control of SARS-CoV-2 infection.”

Although this was a well-designed study, it had several key limitations. During the study period, there was a low burden of community COVID-19 infections in Denmark, and the study intervention only lasted for 1 month. Cafés and restaurants were closed for the first half of the study. Mask adherence relied on retrospective self-reports. Participants in the mask group had more documented household COVID-19 infections (n= 52) than in the control group (n=39). The antibody test used for diagnosis of COVID-19 infection had a sensitivity of only 82.5%. Finally, there was a trend toward protection in the mask group, which could have been significant had more subjects been recruited to the study or if the community burden of COVID-19 had been higher.

Please consider following two writings:

[1]: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.31.20166116v...

[2]: https://wmjonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/119/4/229.pdf

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