"The Cochrane review, for all of its controversy, is a reminder that more research on masking is needed, if only to address whether pro-mask policies warrant the rage they incite. You would think that the policy makers who encouraged masking would have made finding that support a priority."

Well, it depends on what the intent of the masking policy is. Unlike, say, a vaccine or an antiviral, where there are several possibilities and you have good reason to believe that if you test enough of them, at least one will work, and you want to know which one, masking was to a certain extent a placebo whose main purpose was to provide psychological support. I mean, if even in controlled studies N95 masks block "57 to 90 percent of particles", it's a bit tricky to see how that will block a self-replicating virus that doesn't need to hit you with enough particles to take you down, it just needs to get a small number (in theory, one) particle snuck past your immune system.

But what masks, and masking policy, did do was keep 50+% of the population from running screaming into the wilderness and hiding until they starved. They probably were the only mental health precaution that did any mitigation of the many other mental-health-damaging policies. If you did a well-controlled study that showed that you needed full SCBA to actually block a respiratory virus, it would have removed the only emotional prop that a lot of people had.