That’s the theory that people have traditionally advanced, yes. Is there any evidence that capturing heavier droplets has any material effect on transmission?

That’s the theory that people have traditionally advanced, yes. Is there any evidence that capturing heavier droplets has any material effect on transmission? No. And we know that transmission is driven by aerosols now. Aerosols are not heavy droplets. Moreover, at this point, it isn’t challenging to find cities and states with high levels of mask compliance, and spiking cases: https://mobile.twitter.com/ianmSC/status/1329187274794225666/photo/1 https://mobile.twitter.com/ianmSC/status/1329187274794225666... https://mobile.twitter.com/ianmSC/status/1329218665187745794/photo/1 https://mobile.twitter.com/ianmSC/status/1329218665187745794... https://mobile.twitter.com/yinonw/status/1329558423604695046/photo/1 https://mobile.twitter.com/yinonw/status/1329558423604695046... https://mobile.twitter.com/ianmSC/status/1329610060125749251/photo/1 https://mobile.twitter.com/ianmSC/status/1329610060125749251... A great many preprints were created in the the spring (when cases were on the decline in the northern hemisphere) claiming to prove that masks “work”, based on the same kinds of observations. Now that cases are increasing in the northern hemisphere, I eagerly await a revisiting of those publications.