The concern definitely seems to be founded [2] because lipreading is an important part of language acquisition, but there's not a lot of evidence. A fact check

The concern definitely seems to be founded [2] because lipreading is an important part of language acquisition, but there's not a lot of evidence. A fact check by Reuters says that the experts they spoke to were not aware of evidence that masks lead to increased speech impairment [0] and links to one study [1] that shows they do not interfere. [0]: https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-masks-child-speech-development/fact-check-social-media-claims-that-masks-delay-childrens-speech-development-are-missing-context-idUSL1N2U62CO https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-masks-child-speech... [1]: https://news.miami.edu/stories/2021/09/psychologists-masks-do-not-impede-preschoolers-language-development.html https://news.miami.edu/stories/2021/09/psychologists-masks-d... [2]: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/masks-can-be-detrimental-to-babies-speech-and-language-development1/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/masks-can-be-detr...