Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/05/24/new-study-provides-the-definitive-answer-on-masks-they-work.html
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Counterpoint: wearing a mask runs counter to my fundamental Constitutionally-guaranteed God-given freedom to not be even mildly inconvenienced, and therefore I would sooner see all my friends and neighbors die of the plague before I strap one of those Satanic objects to my face.
Suck on that, public-health nerds!
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Oh, you and your experts and empirical research! Next you elites will be telling us that vaccines work.
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And then there’s seasonal allergies and air pollution. So many reasons to wear masks and not many reasons not to wear one.
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I had hoped that COVID-19 would normalize wearing a mask to protect others when you’re sick, as people routinely do in Asia. We would all be healthier if that became a cultural norm.
Instead, it seems to have had the opposite effect. It’s probably only a matter of time before “spewing snot”, the epidemiological equivalent of “rolling coal”, becomes standard practice among a certain sector of the population. Eventually, someone will probably develop special attachments you can wear to maximize the dispersal of pathogens, because fuck you, libt*rd, that’s why.
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Counter-counterpoint: I will wear a mask, even (especially) if the government declare it is illegal to do so.
Be ungovernable, for the sake of peoples health.
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But think of Bill Gates and how that sedative is full of his microchips! It’s not like it is full of Elon Musk’s microchips which are permitted by conspiracy theorists.
/s
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BuT My FrEeDom…
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One thing that this report touched on that I hope we pay more attention to if and when we have to deal with a similar pandemic in the future.
In schools, masks did help, but not as much as improving air circulation in the classrooms did. From the report:
Obviously this isn’t an either/or proposition and we should have done both.
Note that the ventilation improvement that’s described in that citation was for better air circulation and filtration in indoor settings. There’s other data out there showing that being outdoors was at least an order of magnitude safer than being indoors, yet when schools reopened the possibility of moving classes outside wasn’t even part of the conversation, let alone something that was widely adopted. It wouldn’t have necessarily been an option everywhere but in suburban Southern California where I live the good weather and available open space on the school campuses in my area were practically begging for folks to try outdoor learning. Instead students were cooped up indoors part of the week, learning remotely part of the week, on a weird hybrid schedule that seemed to be the worst of both options with the advantages of neither.
And don’t get me started on the fact that my state reopened karaoke bars (the sites of several mass-infection events) long before reopening schools.
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Sadly, in too many schools they can’t open windows or deal well with extreme temperatures:
It would’ve been great to see pandemic funds specifically for this, but all that makes the news are businesses that benefitted from that. 
ETA:
I was recently in a line outside a store. People didn’t maintain much distance, so I masked up despite the heat instead of waiting until going indoors. Two women with children got right behind me, and one started talking about the weird spots that she found on her face that morning. 
With so many outbreaks of “childhood” diseases in recent news, I’m getting more worried about them. My latest COVID booster was last month, vs. 50 years ago for MMR and the rest.
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If there’s a problem… shoot it.
If shooting didn’t help, then it wasn’t a problem or it never existed in the first place.
'murica!
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Own the Libs! Wear a mask!
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I know that in my case, I’m still masking and I haven’t caught a cold or the flu since… I can’t even remember. That’s using the cheap cloth disposable masks, not the medically-rated ones. I don’t wash my hands when I get home, although since the pandemic I’ve avoided sharing elevators with other people, if I can avoid it.
The one time I didn’t mask as much was during a trip in 2022, when I flew to another city for a friend’s wedding. 60-ish people, all unmasked, large indoor space. I also went to a busy university library to do some research, talked with staff there, and met up with old friends. Later we did two escape rooms. Somewhere along the way, I finally caught Covid, it could have come from any of those places.
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Singing moistly!
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Struggling to decide if this is a great study or an outrageous one. The idea that a study determining that masks work is determined to be worthy of publication says so much about where we are. just…
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Looks like the U of Calgary is going to run afoul of Danielle Smith’s Ideology Police for daring to mention this. 
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Third, respirators are significantly more effective than medical or cloth masks.
Why is it that the few times I see someone wearing a mask (maybe once a week or less), they invariably wear a disposable medical mask? FFP2 (=N95) masks have become so cheap and available thanks to the pandemic that I don’t see a reason not to choose them over medical masks. You’d think the people who still mask are also the ones who are informed about the topic, yet they don’t seem to be.
(And yes, I do realise that if you simply want to protect others from you rather than vice versa, a normal mask is enough. Then again, why not choose the better version?)
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yes absolutely we should be focused on CLEANING THE AIR, too. we’ve had years and so much gov’t pandemic money, we should have invested in clean air. it’s as important as clean water! this is 100% the key to a safer, healthier future. i fear we’ve learned nothing, though. ugh.
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