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IIRC, they advised against masks because (1) they didn’t know it was airborne and (2) there was a huge PPE shortage and discouraging a run on PPE would allow mo

IIRC, they advised against masks because (1) they didn’t know it was airborne and (2) there was a huge PPE shortage and discouraging a run on PPE would allow more to go to healthcare professionals. In the beginning there was a ton of investigation on how big of droplets the virus could subsist in (we were all wiping down packages) and it wasn’t clear how the virus was transmitted. As they got more actionable information, they revised their guidance. Not saying they were perfect but there was some fog of war during the spring of 2020 that can’t be dismissed.

iudqnolq 4y ago
The coventional wisdom in epidemiology that diseases can be separated into those spread by aerosols and those spread by droplets. This turns out to be complete nonsense based on a single flawed decades old study claiming particles larger than 5 microns can't stay in the air for an extended period of time, when the actual limit is orders of magnitudes higher. The failure of the public health establishment to realize this reflects long-standing issues the field has with appreciating research done by experts in other fields. Aerosol scientists knew all this, and tried to tell them. Luckily the CDC has admitted it's mistake, though they haven't properly updated guidance accordingly. https://www.wired.com/story/the-teeny-tiny-scientific-screwup-that-helped-covid-kill/ https://www.wired.com/story/the-teeny-tiny-scientific-screwu...
thisisdumb93 4y ago
[flagged]
- iudqnolq 4y ago
  > A) all these experts somehow conspired in record time to broadcast very similar lies to a global audience. If many people have similar incentives they can act similarly without explicit coordination. > B) that all hospitals, doctors, nursing homes across the world ALL failed to stock vital supplies. Not all, but many. This was obvious to anyone watching at the time. Remember the doctors wearing trash bags in the USA? Remember the patients in parking lots? > The "more actionable information" you speak of, is btw, shoddy beyond belief. There are three major pieces to this: I have no clue where you got this idea this is the evidence. The evidence for masks is physics: We know COVID is spread by aerosols, and we know masks filter aerosols. That's all you need.

iudqnolq 4y ago

The coventional wisdom in epidemiology that diseases can be separated into those spread by aerosols and those spread by droplets. This turns out to be complete nonsense based on a single flawed decades old study claiming particles larger than 5 microns can't stay in the air for an extended period of time, when the actual limit is orders of magnitudes higher. The failure of the public health establishment to realize this reflects long-standing issues the field has with appreciating research done by experts in other fields. Aerosol scientists knew all this, and tried to tell them. Luckily the CDC has admitted it's mistake, though they haven't properly updated guidance accordingly. https://www.wired.com/story/the-teeny-tiny-scientific-screwup-that-helped-covid-kill/ https://www.wired.com/story/the-teeny-tiny-scientific-screwu...

thisisdumb93 4y ago

[flagged]

iudqnolq 4y ago
> A) all these experts somehow conspired in record time to broadcast very similar lies to a global audience. If many people have similar incentives they can act similarly without explicit coordination. > B) that all hospitals, doctors, nursing homes across the world ALL failed to stock vital supplies. Not all, but many. This was obvious to anyone watching at the time. Remember the doctors wearing trash bags in the USA? Remember the patients in parking lots? > The "more actionable information" you speak of, is btw, shoddy beyond belief. There are three major pieces to this: I have no clue where you got this idea this is the evidence. The evidence for masks is physics: We know COVID is spread by aerosols, and we know masks filter aerosols. That's all you need.