What's so bad about face masks? Just trying to understand.
You struggle to understand people's muffled words, they struggle to understand yours. Facial expressions, the most important component of non-verbal communication, are half-hidden. Conveying a smile, the universal way to express warmth, is completely not possible.
Happiness psychology research has confirmed again and again that pleasant interactions with other humans is one of the primary sources of joy in our lives. Seeing each other faces is a critical component of that. People who lose their legs or arms will recover to baseline happiness in a year or so. People who's faces are disfigured never recover. The face is the core of human interaction.
0: https://www.npr.org/2017/09/11/550058353/rough-translation-h...
My cute cat mask does not give me the psychological conditioning of a person with a permanently disfigured face.
The only way to completely seal off your mouth and nose is to wear a more fitted mask. The masks most (probably 99%+) people are wearing are ducting air on either side of the nose.
And yes, most masks have the metal piece to help with this, but it doesn’t work. No matter how I adjust the metal piece, air makes its way out.
So if what you’re saying is true, these cloth/disposable masks are not working, and the CDC should be telling everyone to stop wearing them, and switch to ones that properly seal your nose/mouth.
> With some work it's possible to find and fit masks that don't fog glasses.
I’m not convinced this is true, or maybe my face just won’t work with the typical mask. But most (all?) people I know that have glasses fog them up, with any amount of adjustment of the metal piece/mask.
EDIT: I see a downvote already, so curious how this is a flawed extrapolation. My logic is simply assuming the parent’s logic is true, and extrapolating from that. I’m not explicitly agreeing or disagreeing with it. A downvote means you either feel my extrapolation is flawed (please explain), or you think the parent’s logic is flawed (in which case you shouldn’t be downvoting my extrapolation).
They absolutely have legitimate medical uses, and can prevent droplet borne disease transmission and thus there is a plausible mechanism by which they reduce spread. But I don’t think there’s any serious evidence that they are anything more than marginal with respect to the spread of COVID.
Maybe something like this might work better for you? https://www.benosy.com/#welcome
I’m simply stating that if they don’t work, the CDC shouldn’t claim that they do.
I’m basically saying that either the parent is wrong, or the CDC is wrong.
Another option would be to wear a more efficient mask, a less leaking one. I find FFP2 to be quite convenient past the first few seconds when you're surprised by the difference of air flow. Those masks have the advantage of not moving, you don't typically have to adjust them and there's no fog on glasses.
I suppose everyone's situation is different but I haven't noticed any change in the way people interact around me socially with or without a mask.
(No I've never tripped over myself and had it posted to Instagram. But I do worry about it!)
This says that the virus can be an aerosol and that this is what causes infection after long time periods after a spreader was in the area.
Can someone confirm if vape is an appropriate analog to aerosol virus in our breath? If so, the video is very convincing that masks are ineffective at preventing infection.