7 ms·

I live in a state where mask mandates are essentially gone. Very few people wear masks here and they are not required in schools so only ~5% of kids are wearing

I live in a state where mask mandates are essentially gone. Very few people wear masks here and they are not required in schools so only ~5% of kids are wearing them at my children's elementary school. Everything seems pretty good so far, no marked rise in cases and almost no cases in my kids school over the last year, maybe 25 total, all mild. I am in no way saying masks don't work, in fact I think that they do. With that said, I have not worn a mask in a long time, I am fully vaccinated including a booster and essentially figure that is enough. I work from home so if I get covid its going to be from my kids. "We have to be mindful of people like this when thinking about dropping mask mandates and such." Not arguing with you, just genuinely interested on how long you would advocate for mask mandates? Would you be willing to accept mask mandates in perpetuity?

sjwalter 5y ago
> I am in no way saying masks don't work, in fact I think that they do. This is still so hilarious to me. It's pretty obvious that some masks work, that is, n95 or whatever actual respirator masks. It's pretty obvious that other masks don't work at all, that is, 99.99% of masks worn by the public at large.
- mitigating 5y ago
  " It's pretty obvious that other masks don't work at all" So a N95 mask works and covering your mouth with a bandana has no effect at all? Not even 10%?
  - adolph 5y ago
    I was putting on two N95s until someone said three was three times as effective so I started wearing three, then one day I did the math myself and don’tcha know, 95% of 95% of 95% is 86%! So I’m back to one mask now, underneath my motorcycle helmet.
- roywiggins 5y ago
  Surgical masks probably help on a population level. https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2021/09/surgical-masks-covid-19.html https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2021/09/surgical-mask...
  - jjgreen 5y ago
    This is still in peer-review
    - roywiggins 5y ago
      It's since been published in Science. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abi9069 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abi9069
- iso1631 5y ago
  Given that surgical masks stop droplets from spreading as much (especially when you sneeze), and given that bugs spread via droplets, clearly they do something. You may argue on the level of that reduction, or that your right to go out in public without wearing a mask outweighs that reduction, but to just say "masks don't work" is disingenuous.
roywiggins 5y ago
We are maybe a couple months from Pfizer's new antiviral becoming widely available, and it will probably work for immune compromised people. There's also a recent EUA for a long-acting antibody PrEP injection that should help immune compromised people avoid infection in the first place. Both of these may be widely available in the US quite soon.
- wonderwonder 5y ago
  This is a good response and I think would be something that should be taken into account. I am still not going to start masking again unless a much more severe variant rises but I can understand setting a firm deadline based on an emerging technologies. Issue is that there will never be a 100% solution and some states more willing than others to let mandates run forever. What happens if those emerging technologies are not as effective as hoped? It becomes a slippery slope with the deadline kicked down the road. Personally I think we are all going to get covid eventually in much the same way we all get the flu. Everyone that wanted to get vaccinated (in the US) and boosted has had a chance to do so now. Most Americans that want to avoid human contact can for the most part via amazon and food delivery services, work is obviously a different matter for most people. Perhaps I am selfish which I am open to, but at this point after having taken 3 shots and been very mask conscious for the first ~14 months I am tapped out and willing to roll the dice as the risk ratio seems relatively low to my age group and I have no pre-existing morbidities.
  - roywiggins 5y ago
    The Pfizer data on their new pill Paxlovid is very good. It's not emerging, it's here and will be available to people very soon. We will probably all get covid, wouldn't it be better if we all got it after treatments that cut deaths by 90% are widely available? https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/12/14/does-pfizer-covid-pill-paxlovid-work/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/12/14/does-pfizer...
- landemva 5y ago
  The unmentionable and ridiculously safe antiviral is available today. But Ivermectin is cheap so it must not be considered.
Karsteski 5y ago
> Not arguing with you, just genuinely interested on how long you would advocate for mask mandates? Would you be willing to accept mask mandates in perpetuity? This is the problem, isn't it? For how long will these mandates be in place for? Right now, it's clear that they won't end until populations start revolting.
- jkubicek 5y ago
  > Right now, it's clear that they won't end until populations start revolting. That's not at all clear. My very cautious Northern California county dropped the mask mandates when cases started dropping this summer and only re-implimented them when cases and hospitalizations started to rise again. I don't see any reason for them not to drop the mandates again when infection/hospitalization rates drop down to acceptable levels.
  - spookthesunset 5y ago
    > acceptable levels Define acceptable levels? And does this suggest we continue masking every winter when "cases surge"? There will always be a variant of covid. Always. It's never going away. Basing mask mandates of any metric, be it cases, hospitalizations or deaths means every winter you'll be wearing a state mandated mask.
    - jkubicek 5y ago
      Are you trolling or do you really think that "every winter you'll be wearing a state mandated mask"? We've been in this pandemic now for close to 2 years. At every single point, government rules and guidance have lagged recommendations from the experts. I'm confident that there is exactly 0 chance that any governmental body in the US is going to continue to mandate masking after it's no longer necessary.
      - spookthesunset 5y ago
        > Are you trolling or do you really think that "every winter you'll be wearing a state mandated mask"? At this point, in the states that have mandates? I'm honestly not sure. There sure seems to be no rush to remove them despite having low "cases" and hospitalizations not being an issue. And given none of these states have given a single hint as to when they will go away... who knows? States that continue this are absolutely normalizing mandated masks. Vaccines were sold as the end of masks (and they morally should have been regardless of what politicians say). Vaccines are the best we can do. Mandated masks in a post-vaccine world makes absolutely no sense at all. What other target could a government reasonably set after a vaccine? "Cases"? "Hospitalizations"? Well... those will always be there. So do we just keep doing this forever? And if you say "hospital capacity" shouldn't these governments have fixed that already? We gave them two years and it was an emergency so where is the hospital capacity we put our lives on hold for? I mean, its still an emergency right? Shouldn't people be super pissed that government hasn't dealt with the actual problem they keep saying we have?
nicoburns 5y ago
> Would you be willing to accept mask mandates in perpetuity? I think it depends on location. In key environments like public transport and supermarkets and other spaces that everyone needs to be able to access it seems reasonable to me that we might keep them for at least a 5-10 year horizon if that proves necessary. It just doesn't seem like a big deal to wear a mask, and it would cut down on the need for more restrictive measures like lockdowns.
- rajup 5y ago
  No thanks.
- lieut_data 5y ago
  > It just doesn't seem like a big deal to wear a mask, and it would cut down on the need for more restrictive measures like lockdowns. My wife has a medical exemption from wearing a mask. She cannot live a normal life when the standard response to her being out in public is disgust, constant questioning, or outright rejecting her due to "in-store policies." My father has been wearing a mask, but constantly deals with hyperventilation issues. He's working with his family doctor to determine next steps. Some things are a big deal for some people. I support anyone wearing a mask if they so choose. I oppose mask mandates as a one-size fits all solution.
  - kenjackson 5y ago
    Actually legit medical exemptions are rare. Why can't we do mandates with exemptions (maybe an exemption card from a doctor)?
    - lieut_data 5y ago
      > Why can't we do mandates with exemptions (maybe an exemption card from a doctor)? I expect my wife would have to strap her card over her mouth to satisfy the social pressure to conform. It's not in most people's imaginations that anyone else could suffer from something that doesn't bother them.
- 5y ago
iso1631 5y ago
It's interesting how Scotland, which kept a mask mandate, and England, which dropped it, affected cases. From start to end of October, cases per 100k, 7 day average Glasgow -- 300->220 Edinburgh -- 210->250 Manchester -- 290->220 Birmingham -- 250->280 4 similar cities, two with mask mandates, two without. And smaller ones Aberdeen -- 267->330 Southampton -- 300->410 Perth -- 320->260 Hereford -- 290->580 So there may be something there, would need more data to really see, but it certainly isn't a glowing mandate for masks
- sjg007 5y ago
  There are plenty of scientific studies showing that masks work.
  - spookthesunset 5y ago
    All conducted in the heat of the moment where saying anything that gives the slightest wiff of "masks don't work" gets you shunned, your career destroyed, and all social media platforms labeling your content as "misinformation". Yeah... I'm sure all these studies done post-2019 are totally legit though.
  - iso1631 5y ago
    But do they show how much mask mandates work in the real world, do they explain why Edinburgh and Glasgow are indistingishable from Mancehster and Birmingham in numbers of cases detected?
    - Aloha 5y ago
      I think in reality, COVID fatigue has set in, and thats the issue.
      - iso1631 5y ago
        Via what mechanism? Were people not wearing masks in Scotland despite the mandate? Were they wearing masks in England despite no mandate? Is there enough difference in behaviour between Glasgow and Manchester to explain the difference?
sjg007 5y ago
Just wear a mask in indoor public places until the pandemic is over.
- wonderwonder 5y ago
  Your solution is a good one and makes logical sense but do you think that this pandemic is going to end? It shows no signs of abating currently and the new variant is even more communicable. How does one determine when the pandemic has ended, what is the benchmark? Covid will always be with us going forward. your solution also involves kids wearing masks in school for potentially years and years. I noticed a massive difference in behavior with my youngest kid during his year of wearing a mask in school and after the mandate went away. He went from a reserved almost sad little kid when I picked him up each day back to his prior outgoing happy self after a few weeks. Obviously my experience is anecdotal but I have spoken with other parents that observed the same.
- spookthesunset 5y ago
  > Just wear a mask in indoor public places until the pandemic is over. I'm fully vaccinated, so why should I? And when will the pandemic "be over"? Covid is here forever and ever. As long as we keep testing at the level we do, we will always find new variants and always see "spikes" of cases every single winter. When, specifically, do the states with mask mandates remove them? Why not today? What makes a month better? Or a year? Or never? Pushing for masks at this stage is arguing we wear masks forever. That isn't a world I care to live in.
- jaywalk 5y ago
  No.
ineedasername 5y ago
"Everything seems pretty good so far" There shortages of hospital beds across many states [0] If you want a full perspective on things, look further than your own state. Unless you live in Wyoming, Colorado, Alaska, North Dakota, or Montana then everything is not going very well. Most people don't live in these states, and many of the states with loose mask mandates are not in that short list. A small are just about holding their ground, but about 40 states have seen a >= 15% increase in infections just in the last two weeks, and one of the least restrictive states for mask mandates (Texas) has increased by 80%. [1] [0] https://protect-public.hhs.gov/pages/hospital-utilization https://protect-public.hhs.gov/pages/hospital-utilization [1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/covid-cases.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/covid-cases.html
- landemva 5y ago
  Increase in infections does not equal death. It does bring the population closer to herd immunity. Infections and recovery bring sterilizing immunity, which is not provided by the shots.
  - ineedasername 5y ago
    Infections have been a lagging indicator for deaths this entire time and immunity from infections does not appear to last as long as immunity from vaccinations. The people most resistant to right now are those who had covid already and get vaccinated. I also don't understand your assessment that we are reaching (or can reach) herd immunity: We're not there on the common cold or influenza, and it seems COVID mutates at rates that will keep it around as well. Early evidence on Omicron indicates that it in particular is better at reinfection than other strains, so I hope the data in the next few weeks confirms its milder nature, but reinfection provides even more opportunity for variants to emerge. We're much better off than we were a year ago: The holiday spike is (so far) not as bad, deaths are lower than last year at this time, and vaccines are widely available. But we're not back to normal yet (probably never will be) and I don't think we're doing as well right now as we could be, and I think we can make a lot more progress before we declare this thing over and adjust to a new status-quo.
- 5y ago

sjwalter 5y ago

> I am in no way saying masks don't work, in fact I think that they do. This is still so hilarious to me. It's pretty obvious that some masks work, that is, n95 or whatever actual respirator masks. It's pretty obvious that other masks don't work at all, that is, 99.99% of masks worn by the public at large.

mitigating 5y ago
" It's pretty obvious that other masks don't work at all" So a N95 mask works and covering your mouth with a bandana has no effect at all? Not even 10%?
- adolph 5y ago
  I was putting on two N95s until someone said three was three times as effective so I started wearing three, then one day I did the math myself and don’tcha know, 95% of 95% of 95% is 86%! So I’m back to one mask now, underneath my motorcycle helmet.
roywiggins 5y ago
Surgical masks probably help on a population level. https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2021/09/surgical-masks-covid-19.html https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2021/09/surgical-mask...
- jjgreen 5y ago
  This is still in peer-review
  - roywiggins 5y ago
    It's since been published in Science. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abi9069 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abi9069
iso1631 5y ago
Given that surgical masks stop droplets from spreading as much (especially when you sneeze), and given that bugs spread via droplets, clearly they do something. You may argue on the level of that reduction, or that your right to go out in public without wearing a mask outweighs that reduction, but to just say "masks don't work" is disingenuous.

roywiggins 5y ago

We are maybe a couple months from Pfizer's new antiviral becoming widely available, and it will probably work for immune compromised people. There's also a recent EUA for a long-acting antibody PrEP injection that should help immune compromised people avoid infection in the first place. Both of these may be widely available in the US quite soon.

wonderwonder 5y ago
This is a good response and I think would be something that should be taken into account. I am still not going to start masking again unless a much more severe variant rises but I can understand setting a firm deadline based on an emerging technologies. Issue is that there will never be a 100% solution and some states more willing than others to let mandates run forever. What happens if those emerging technologies are not as effective as hoped? It becomes a slippery slope with the deadline kicked down the road. Personally I think we are all going to get covid eventually in much the same way we all get the flu. Everyone that wanted to get vaccinated (in the US) and boosted has had a chance to do so now. Most Americans that want to avoid human contact can for the most part via amazon and food delivery services, work is obviously a different matter for most people. Perhaps I am selfish which I am open to, but at this point after having taken 3 shots and been very mask conscious for the first ~14 months I am tapped out and willing to roll the dice as the risk ratio seems relatively low to my age group and I have no pre-existing morbidities.
- roywiggins 5y ago
  The Pfizer data on their new pill Paxlovid is very good. It's not emerging, it's here and will be available to people very soon. We will probably all get covid, wouldn't it be better if we all got it after treatments that cut deaths by 90% are widely available? https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/12/14/does-pfizer-covid-pill-paxlovid-work/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/12/14/does-pfizer...
landemva 5y ago
The unmentionable and ridiculously safe antiviral is available today. But Ivermectin is cheap so it must not be considered.

Karsteski 5y ago

> Not arguing with you, just genuinely interested on how long you would advocate for mask mandates? Would you be willing to accept mask mandates in perpetuity? This is the problem, isn't it? For how long will these mandates be in place for? Right now, it's clear that they won't end until populations start revolting.

jkubicek 5y ago
> Right now, it's clear that they won't end until populations start revolting. That's not at all clear. My very cautious Northern California county dropped the mask mandates when cases started dropping this summer and only re-implimented them when cases and hospitalizations started to rise again. I don't see any reason for them not to drop the mandates again when infection/hospitalization rates drop down to acceptable levels.
- spookthesunset 5y ago
  > acceptable levels Define acceptable levels? And does this suggest we continue masking every winter when "cases surge"? There will always be a variant of covid. Always. It's never going away. Basing mask mandates of any metric, be it cases, hospitalizations or deaths means every winter you'll be wearing a state mandated mask.
  - jkubicek 5y ago
    Are you trolling or do you really think that "every winter you'll be wearing a state mandated mask"? We've been in this pandemic now for close to 2 years. At every single point, government rules and guidance have lagged recommendations from the experts. I'm confident that there is exactly 0 chance that any governmental body in the US is going to continue to mandate masking after it's no longer necessary.
    - spookthesunset 5y ago
      > Are you trolling or do you really think that "every winter you'll be wearing a state mandated mask"? At this point, in the states that have mandates? I'm honestly not sure. There sure seems to be no rush to remove them despite having low "cases" and hospitalizations not being an issue. And given none of these states have given a single hint as to when they will go away... who knows? States that continue this are absolutely normalizing mandated masks. Vaccines were sold as the end of masks (and they morally should have been regardless of what politicians say). Vaccines are the best we can do. Mandated masks in a post-vaccine world makes absolutely no sense at all. What other target could a government reasonably set after a vaccine? "Cases"? "Hospitalizations"? Well... those will always be there. So do we just keep doing this forever? And if you say "hospital capacity" shouldn't these governments have fixed that already? We gave them two years and it was an emergency so where is the hospital capacity we put our lives on hold for? I mean, its still an emergency right? Shouldn't people be super pissed that government hasn't dealt with the actual problem they keep saying we have?

nicoburns 5y ago

> Would you be willing to accept mask mandates in perpetuity? I think it depends on location. In key environments like public transport and supermarkets and other spaces that everyone needs to be able to access it seems reasonable to me that we might keep them for at least a 5-10 year horizon if that proves necessary. It just doesn't seem like a big deal to wear a mask, and it would cut down on the need for more restrictive measures like lockdowns.

rajup 5y ago
No thanks.
lieut_data 5y ago
> It just doesn't seem like a big deal to wear a mask, and it would cut down on the need for more restrictive measures like lockdowns. My wife has a medical exemption from wearing a mask. She cannot live a normal life when the standard response to her being out in public is disgust, constant questioning, or outright rejecting her due to "in-store policies." My father has been wearing a mask, but constantly deals with hyperventilation issues. He's working with his family doctor to determine next steps. Some things are a big deal for some people. I support anyone wearing a mask if they so choose. I oppose mask mandates as a one-size fits all solution.
- kenjackson 5y ago
  Actually legit medical exemptions are rare. Why can't we do mandates with exemptions (maybe an exemption card from a doctor)?
  - lieut_data 5y ago
    > Why can't we do mandates with exemptions (maybe an exemption card from a doctor)? I expect my wife would have to strap her card over her mouth to satisfy the social pressure to conform. It's not in most people's imaginations that anyone else could suffer from something that doesn't bother them.
5y ago

iso1631 5y ago

It's interesting how Scotland, which kept a mask mandate, and England, which dropped it, affected cases. From start to end of October, cases per 100k, 7 day average Glasgow -- 300->220 Edinburgh -- 210->250 Manchester -- 290->220 Birmingham -- 250->280 4 similar cities, two with mask mandates, two without. And smaller ones Aberdeen -- 267->330 Southampton -- 300->410 Perth -- 320->260 Hereford -- 290->580 So there may be something there, would need more data to really see, but it certainly isn't a glowing mandate for masks

sjg007 5y ago
There are plenty of scientific studies showing that masks work.
- spookthesunset 5y ago
  All conducted in the heat of the moment where saying anything that gives the slightest wiff of "masks don't work" gets you shunned, your career destroyed, and all social media platforms labeling your content as "misinformation". Yeah... I'm sure all these studies done post-2019 are totally legit though.
- iso1631 5y ago
  But do they show how much mask mandates work in the real world, do they explain why Edinburgh and Glasgow are indistingishable from Mancehster and Birmingham in numbers of cases detected?
  - Aloha 5y ago
    I think in reality, COVID fatigue has set in, and thats the issue.
    - iso1631 5y ago
      Via what mechanism? Were people not wearing masks in Scotland despite the mandate? Were they wearing masks in England despite no mandate? Is there enough difference in behaviour between Glasgow and Manchester to explain the difference?

sjg007 5y ago

Just wear a mask in indoor public places until the pandemic is over.

wonderwonder 5y ago
Your solution is a good one and makes logical sense but do you think that this pandemic is going to end? It shows no signs of abating currently and the new variant is even more communicable. How does one determine when the pandemic has ended, what is the benchmark? Covid will always be with us going forward. your solution also involves kids wearing masks in school for potentially years and years. I noticed a massive difference in behavior with my youngest kid during his year of wearing a mask in school and after the mandate went away. He went from a reserved almost sad little kid when I picked him up each day back to his prior outgoing happy self after a few weeks. Obviously my experience is anecdotal but I have spoken with other parents that observed the same.
spookthesunset 5y ago
> Just wear a mask in indoor public places until the pandemic is over. I'm fully vaccinated, so why should I? And when will the pandemic "be over"? Covid is here forever and ever. As long as we keep testing at the level we do, we will always find new variants and always see "spikes" of cases every single winter. When, specifically, do the states with mask mandates remove them? Why not today? What makes a month better? Or a year? Or never? Pushing for masks at this stage is arguing we wear masks forever. That isn't a world I care to live in.
jaywalk 5y ago
No.

ineedasername 5y ago

"Everything seems pretty good so far" There shortages of hospital beds across many states [0] If you want a full perspective on things, look further than your own state. Unless you live in Wyoming, Colorado, Alaska, North Dakota, or Montana then everything is not going very well. Most people don't live in these states, and many of the states with loose mask mandates are not in that short list. A small are just about holding their ground, but about 40 states have seen a >= 15% increase in infections just in the last two weeks, and one of the least restrictive states for mask mandates (Texas) has increased by 80%. [1] [0] https://protect-public.hhs.gov/pages/hospital-utilization https://protect-public.hhs.gov/pages/hospital-utilization [1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/covid-cases.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/covid-cases.html

landemva 5y ago
Increase in infections does not equal death. It does bring the population closer to herd immunity. Infections and recovery bring sterilizing immunity, which is not provided by the shots.
- ineedasername 5y ago
  Infections have been a lagging indicator for deaths this entire time and immunity from infections does not appear to last as long as immunity from vaccinations. The people most resistant to right now are those who had covid already and get vaccinated. I also don't understand your assessment that we are reaching (or can reach) herd immunity: We're not there on the common cold or influenza, and it seems COVID mutates at rates that will keep it around as well. Early evidence on Omicron indicates that it in particular is better at reinfection than other strains, so I hope the data in the next few weeks confirms its milder nature, but reinfection provides even more opportunity for variants to emerge. We're much better off than we were a year ago: The holiday spike is (so far) not as bad, deaths are lower than last year at this time, and vaccines are widely available. But we're not back to normal yet (probably never will be) and I don't think we're doing as well right now as we could be, and I think we can make a lot more progress before we declare this thing over and adjust to a new status-quo.
5y ago