3 ms·

So were you going through life wearing a mask to mitigate the risk of a deadly flu in 2018 and before? I think probably not, but if your priority is risk mitig

So were you going through life wearing a mask to mitigate the risk of a deadly flu in 2018 and before? I think probably not, but if your priority is risk mitigation, shouldn't you have been? Risk mitigation is not my priority. If it were, I'd never ride my bike again, even with my helmet. I'd never go kayaking, or rock climbing. I wouldn't swim in lakes, and you'd never catch me in the ocean. If I were preparing for the worst, I'd go everywhere with a tourniquet in my back pocket, keep a few thousand dollars cash in my shoe, and get myself vaccinated for rabies right now. I have no intent to do any of these things, because such fretting every possibility is no way to live.

awb 5y ago
> So were you going through life wearing a mask to mitigate the risk of a deadly flu in 2018 and before? I think probably not, but if your priority is risk mitigation, shouldn't you have been? No because those flu viruses were not novel, or as deadly. When there is a large degree of uncertainty (like a deadly novel virus), I personally tend towards caution and am fine being too cautious rather than not cautious enough. If you don’t, that’s fine and that’s your choice. The lifestyle examples you give are too simplistic. I’m willing to bet you’re willing to ride your bike on some roads and not others, or swim at some beaches in some weather conditions and not others. To act like you never assess the situation or act in a way that mitigates your risk is absurd. I bet you wear a seatbelt on occasion and look both ways when crossing the road. Those are risk mitigation techniques.
- RobertMiller 5y ago
  > No because those flu viruses were not novel, or as deadly. That information always lags reality. When/if the next deadly flu strain emerges, it will have emerged before it is discovered to have emerged. If you're not planning for this scenario, are you really planning for the worst case? You could be Patient Zero for Spanish Flu Part Two, with your preemptive masking being the difference between global disaster and nothingburger.
  - awb 5y ago
    > If you're not planning for this scenario, are you really planning for the worst case? No, I was being a little loose with my language there. I didn’t mean the literal worst case of being patient 0. I agree that I don’t plan for that. My personal risk tolerance is higher than that. I meant the more colloquial worst case of hearing about a deadly virus spreading rapidly in the news and then deciding to react with an abundance of caution once it seems probable that my community will be affected. Then I’m fine playing it safe. Just like I would with any other forecasted threat from Mother Nature like a fire, hurricane, blizzard, etc. The more certainty it’s going to affect me + the greater uncertainty of the short & long terms effects = the greater the caution. So in 2020 when I was highly confident COVID would infect my community + there was very little info about how deadly it was = I was overly cautious As more info came out I became less cautious.
  - JohnTHaller 5y ago
    We started masks when it became clear the Covid was far more contagious and deadly than the flu.
    - RobertMiller 5y ago
      Not all flus are made equal, and the data about which flus are particularly deadly lags reality. If a flu as deadly as the Spanish Flu emerged again, you would be wise to worry about it. But until then? Until then, I suggest you go about your life. We started wearing masks because covid actually existed, not because we feared that it might one day exist. Fear of hypothetical future covid strains is an example of the later, not the former. I'll consider fearing them once they actually exist, just like those hypothetical future flu strains.
quantum_magpie 5y ago
>So were you going through life wearing a mask to mitigate the risk of a deadly flu in 2018 and before? I think probably not, but if your priority is risk mitigation, shouldn't you have been? During flu season? Of course. As well as soon any cold symptoms were felt. My institution would also issue stay-at-home recommendations during flu outbreaks.
- tptacek 5y ago
  You might have worn a mask during previous flu seasons, but it'd be helpful to acknowledge that almost nobody else did. Prior to COVID, masks were a curiosity, not a norm.
  - xienze 5y ago
    I would also say I’ve never worked anywhere in the US that issued a stay at home order during a flu outbreak either. The poster is definitely exaggerating the state of things prior to Covid IMO.
  - moistly 5y ago
    > Prior to COVID, masks were a curiosity, not a norm. Only because we live in a “me” society and not a “we” society. If we were sensible, masking up would be normal when one has a cold/there’s a local flu outbreak. So much illness and lost productivity would be easily avoided with a minor change in expectations and behaviour.
  - Volundr 5y ago
    > Prior to COVID, masks were a curiosity, not a norm. In the US and much of Europe. In other countries they absolutely were the norm. I'm not advocating for permanent mask wearing, but I absolutely DO think we should have shown more concern for others prior to Covid. It drove me nuts how many people would show up to work with "just a mild flu" or "just a cold" with no concern for the likelihood they might pass it on to others.
    - RobertMiller 5y ago
terminatornet 5y ago
Did you learn to swim before trying swimming in lakes or did you just jump in one day? seems like a risk mitigation to me if you took any lessons or practiced at all. No one's asking for everyone to hide in their houses forever, we want increased testing, contact tracing, and mechanisms for community protection that kick in when cases start to rise, not after they've reached critical mass. Think of these like the swimming lessons you took and laps you did in the pool before you moved on to the lake.
- RobertMiller 5y ago
  Lakes are risky even if you know how to swim. There are amoeba that can swim up your nose and into your brain, giving you a very painful death. This risk can be trivially mitigated by wearing a noseplug or by refraining from swimming in lakes at all. I don't do either of these things, because I don't give a shit about the risk of some amoeba. Some people do, but most people don't. Are there some risks I choose to mitigate? Of course. But there are maaany more risks that I choose to ignore. Everybody is entitled to their own opinions on which risks they want to tolerate and which are intolerable. Which leads to my next point.. >No one's asking for everyone to hide in their houses forever, we want [...] Everybody has their own set of 'common sense' desires, but virtually none of those desires is universal. Using the 'royal we' to implicitly upgrade your personal desires to the desires of society in general is a tedious rhetorical trick. As for general population trends, covid mitigations were quite popular for the past two years, but with every day that passes more and more people stop caring. Go outside and see it for yourself, mask usage is dropping off a cliff even in the progressive west coast city I call home. There will come a day, soon, when wearing a mask will make you the odd one out.
chrismcb 5y ago
While risk mitigation isn't your priority, you do it, all the time. The reward for riding your bike far outweighs what little risk exists. So you ride your bike. Not doing something had a risk as well. Not riding your bike may mean walking on the street for longer or not getting enough exercise. The cost of wearing a mask far outweighs the risk of catching the flu.
- RobertMiller 5y ago

awb 5y ago

> So were you going through life wearing a mask to mitigate the risk of a deadly flu in 2018 and before? I think probably not, but if your priority is risk mitigation, shouldn't you have been? No because those flu viruses were not novel, or as deadly. When there is a large degree of uncertainty (like a deadly novel virus), I personally tend towards caution and am fine being too cautious rather than not cautious enough. If you don’t, that’s fine and that’s your choice. The lifestyle examples you give are too simplistic. I’m willing to bet you’re willing to ride your bike on some roads and not others, or swim at some beaches in some weather conditions and not others. To act like you never assess the situation or act in a way that mitigates your risk is absurd. I bet you wear a seatbelt on occasion and look both ways when crossing the road. Those are risk mitigation techniques.

RobertMiller 5y ago
> No because those flu viruses were not novel, or as deadly. That information always lags reality. When/if the next deadly flu strain emerges, it will have emerged before it is discovered to have emerged. If you're not planning for this scenario, are you really planning for the worst case? You could be Patient Zero for Spanish Flu Part Two, with your preemptive masking being the difference between global disaster and nothingburger.
- awb 5y ago
  > If you're not planning for this scenario, are you really planning for the worst case? No, I was being a little loose with my language there. I didn’t mean the literal worst case of being patient 0. I agree that I don’t plan for that. My personal risk tolerance is higher than that. I meant the more colloquial worst case of hearing about a deadly virus spreading rapidly in the news and then deciding to react with an abundance of caution once it seems probable that my community will be affected. Then I’m fine playing it safe. Just like I would with any other forecasted threat from Mother Nature like a fire, hurricane, blizzard, etc. The more certainty it’s going to affect me + the greater uncertainty of the short & long terms effects = the greater the caution. So in 2020 when I was highly confident COVID would infect my community + there was very little info about how deadly it was = I was overly cautious As more info came out I became less cautious.
- JohnTHaller 5y ago
  We started masks when it became clear the Covid was far more contagious and deadly than the flu.
  - RobertMiller 5y ago
    Not all flus are made equal, and the data about which flus are particularly deadly lags reality. If a flu as deadly as the Spanish Flu emerged again, you would be wise to worry about it. But until then? Until then, I suggest you go about your life. We started wearing masks because covid actually existed, not because we feared that it might one day exist. Fear of hypothetical future covid strains is an example of the later, not the former. I'll consider fearing them once they actually exist, just like those hypothetical future flu strains.

quantum_magpie 5y ago

>So were you going through life wearing a mask to mitigate the risk of a deadly flu in 2018 and before? I think probably not, but if your priority is risk mitigation, shouldn't you have been? During flu season? Of course. As well as soon any cold symptoms were felt. My institution would also issue stay-at-home recommendations during flu outbreaks.

tptacek 5y ago
You might have worn a mask during previous flu seasons, but it'd be helpful to acknowledge that almost nobody else did. Prior to COVID, masks were a curiosity, not a norm.
- xienze 5y ago
  I would also say I’ve never worked anywhere in the US that issued a stay at home order during a flu outbreak either. The poster is definitely exaggerating the state of things prior to Covid IMO.
- moistly 5y ago
  > Prior to COVID, masks were a curiosity, not a norm. Only because we live in a “me” society and not a “we” society. If we were sensible, masking up would be normal when one has a cold/there’s a local flu outbreak. So much illness and lost productivity would be easily avoided with a minor change in expectations and behaviour.
- Volundr 5y ago
  > Prior to COVID, masks were a curiosity, not a norm. In the US and much of Europe. In other countries they absolutely were the norm. I'm not advocating for permanent mask wearing, but I absolutely DO think we should have shown more concern for others prior to Covid. It drove me nuts how many people would show up to work with "just a mild flu" or "just a cold" with no concern for the likelihood they might pass it on to others.
  - RobertMiller 5y ago

terminatornet 5y ago

Did you learn to swim before trying swimming in lakes or did you just jump in one day? seems like a risk mitigation to me if you took any lessons or practiced at all. No one's asking for everyone to hide in their houses forever, we want increased testing, contact tracing, and mechanisms for community protection that kick in when cases start to rise, not after they've reached critical mass. Think of these like the swimming lessons you took and laps you did in the pool before you moved on to the lake.

RobertMiller 5y ago
Lakes are risky even if you know how to swim. There are amoeba that can swim up your nose and into your brain, giving you a very painful death. This risk can be trivially mitigated by wearing a noseplug or by refraining from swimming in lakes at all. I don't do either of these things, because I don't give a shit about the risk of some amoeba. Some people do, but most people don't. Are there some risks I choose to mitigate? Of course. But there are maaany more risks that I choose to ignore. Everybody is entitled to their own opinions on which risks they want to tolerate and which are intolerable. Which leads to my next point.. >No one's asking for everyone to hide in their houses forever, we want [...] Everybody has their own set of 'common sense' desires, but virtually none of those desires is universal. Using the 'royal we' to implicitly upgrade your personal desires to the desires of society in general is a tedious rhetorical trick. As for general population trends, covid mitigations were quite popular for the past two years, but with every day that passes more and more people stop caring. Go outside and see it for yourself, mask usage is dropping off a cliff even in the progressive west coast city I call home. There will come a day, soon, when wearing a mask will make you the odd one out.

chrismcb 5y ago

While risk mitigation isn't your priority, you do it, all the time. The reward for riding your bike far outweighs what little risk exists. So you ride your bike. Not doing something had a risk as well. Not riding your bike may mean walking on the street for longer or not getting enough exercise. The cost of wearing a mask far outweighs the risk of catching the flu.

RobertMiller 5y ago