Wearing masks is usually only a minor inconvenience. I'm gobsmacked how it's become such a battleground.
Not necessarily. The mask blocks the virus going both ways, so maybe only 10% of the virus particles get inside the mask, but 90% of those that would be exhaled also stay inside the mask.
This is not an opinion on whether masks work, just an illustration that it's plausible they don't.
90% of infected person virus stays in
90% of virus does not get in for a healthy person
So 1% (10% through * 10% through) of final particles will be inside the mask. Hence roughly 0.9% of particles (90% stays inside of the mask of the healthy person) would stick around by this logic
Vs 100% of particles that could enter will enter without any sort of mask
Exactly. We're lacking a crucial number. So wear a mask.
The debate is whether they help by 0.001%, 99% or some number inbetween.
And until there's strong evidence then we're back to the precautionary principle (or as I like to put it "just shut-up and where your damn mask")
But I don't agree that "the precautionary principle" is sufficient justification for a government mandate. Clear evidence should be required to impose the mandate.
And my previous post was not agreeing with you; it implied that masks may work or may make things worse by trapping more virus particles inside the mask.
Another post here linked to a study that showed that certain kinds of masks can sometimes be worse than no mask, even ignoring the "trapping" factor, by actually increasing the droplet count in the air.
It is in many other realms. Why raise the bar for this?
This whole thing feels like whatever the equivalent is of "virtue signalling". Why have some groups decided to be so stubborn about this particular thing? It smacks of some identity thing.
Which is fine when the public demonstration of a point of principle isn't as important as the thing itself. Otherwise it's a collective act of cutting of one's nose to spite one's face.
But maybe this is the part that is somewhat US specific. The relationship of the people to the government seems to have an almost mythic role in political identity - rather than a somewhat more pragmatic one that I recognize in the UK.
Maybe it is minor inconvenience for you but for me its a huge inconvenience.
I actually really dislike wearing a mask and sometimes have a mild panicky feeling of suffocating and have to move to a window. (I get a similar thing snorkeling).
But it's no big deal. I'm a grown up and I deal with it because it's a good thing to do for other people. I understand some people might have really strong psychological reactions and that's why we have mask exemptions.
But I don't think that applies to the majority of the people that are claiming wearing a mask is a massive problem for them. I really don't.
It's no big deal for you, fine. I acknowledge that but It is a big deal for me.
>I'm a grown up and I deal with it because it's a good thing to do for other people.
well not to me, when you wearing mask when interacting with me you are not doing a good thing for me.
I'm much prefer for you to not wear mask when you interact with me but still I wouldn't force you.
Its also one of the reason for me to not wear mask when interacting with other people, its a good thing to do for other people.
Yes I am. I am reducing the chance of infection passing between us. The degree to which I'm reducing the chance is uncertain (which is the original point under discussion).
I think we probably won't get any further benefit from this discussion. I've lost patience with a lot of people over this. I find it slightly depressing that this has become the identity issue it has.
No, you think you are doing good for me but reducing the chance of infection passing is not a concern for me at all so its not doing any good for me.
>I think we probably won't get any further benefit from this discussion. I've lost patience with a lot of people over this. I find it slightly depressing that this has become the identity issue it has.
Not surprising because you dismissing other people concern and treat it as 'not big deal'.
You've lost me here. Really? Is this the part where I discover you have a completely different view on the whole topic and this discussion was pointless from the beginning?
Yes, among all other thing I concern about, reducing the chance of infection passing between us is the least of my concern.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not against reducing the chance of infection. I support reducing the chance of infection but not with mask.
Because mask has more downside than its ability (if any) to reduce the chance of infection.
>Is this the part where I discover you have a completely different view on the whole topic and this discussion was pointless from the beginning?
I don't know about you but I do not found this discussion to be pointless
That to me suggests you've made that position part and parcel of your identity.
> That to me suggests you've made that position part and parcel of your identity.
I genuinely feel like I'm making a fairly sober, rational and considered point. (Of course everyone thinks that of themselves but hey)
How is increasing the odds of my infecting my immunocompromised mother doing me a favour?
It's a minor inconvenience at the grocery store.
It's a major inconvenience to wear one at gyms.
It's a major inconvenience with regards to socializing with friends (a core human need), I really hate not being able to read other people's facial expressions when I talk to them.
It's a major inconvenience to require it at schools. It's horrible for kids not to be able to see the facial expressions of their teachers or classmates (especially when learning how to read and pronounce words!).
It obviously depends on country and region and the stage of the pandemic, but in the UK there's been plenty of wiggle room at various times.
You know what's really a "major inconvenience" for kids? Dying, or transmitting covid to their parents, killing them, and then growing up with no parents.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/covid19/nhcs/intubation-ventilator-...
Wearing masks and other non-pharmaceutical interventions can be useful under some limited circumstances to avoid overwhelming healthcare systems. But we need to think longer term than just the next few weeks.
And of course, we have a century of history of viruses that now do not exist anymore because we eradicated them. With vaccines.
So what are you even talking about?
Not true.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-br...
The thing to keep in mind is that blocking 50% of the particles does not mean a 50% reduction in infection. It may mean a 50% reduction in infection -- or it may mean a basically zero percent reduction. It depends on the exposure.
Say that in a particular covid-filled room you have a 50% chance of being infected after 5 minutes and a 99.9% chance of being infected after an hour. Under a simple model, if you wear a mask that blocks half the particles, your chance of getting coronavirus in 5 minutes would be reduced to 25%, but your chance of getting it after an hour would be 97%. So if cloth mask is your primary defense against covid, you are eventually going to get covid if you are trying to live anything close to a normal life. Blocking 50% of particles is like wearing an condom that only blocks 50% of the sperm or an umbrella that blocks only 50% of the rain.
The umbrella is a better comparison. My umbrella doesn't prevent 100% of the rain from coming in contact with me. This is good enough that the umbrella is still standard practice.
Whatever that number is, if we limit the number of particles in the air, we decrease the statistical probability that a person will come in contact to a number of particles exceeding that number.
It's a "solution to pollution is dilution" issue.
> it might actually make sense to just give everyone a very small infectious inoculum as a form of vaccination.
The biggest issue with this, as I understand, is straddling the line between causing an immune response and hurting the patient. There are live vaccine viruses, but most (all?) attenuate the virus to prevent the latter.
Or, to put it more on the nose: the half-life for an American getting CoViD under ordinary conditions seems to be longer than a year. Using your linear model, a 50% mask would make it more than two years! So half-life exhaustion doesn't seem an appropriate counterpoint.