6 ms·

There's the Cochrane Collaboration. They don't tick off every item on your list but it's fairly close to what you're asking for. It's mentioned in the article a

There's the Cochrane Collaboration. They don't tick off every item on your list but it's fairly close to what you're asking for. It's mentioned in the article as they do a lot of meta-studies. Unfortunately they only started trying to spot fraudulent RCTs in 2021. Also in recent times some people don't like them, because they did a big review of mask studies and found there was no reliable evidence that masks worked against COVID. Cochrane (formerly known as the Cochrane Collaboration) is a British international charitable organisation formed to organise medical research findings to facilitate evidence-based choices about health interventions involving health professionals, patients and policy makers.[4][5] It includes 53 review groups that are based at research institutions worldwide. Cochrane has approximately 30,000 volunteer experts from around the world.[6] The group conducts systematic reviews of health-care interventions and diagnostic tests and publishes them in the Cochrane Library.[7][4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cochrane_(organisation) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cochrane_(organisation)

camelite 3y ago
"Many commentators have claimed that a recently-updated Cochrane Review shows that 'masks don't work', which is an inaccurate and misleading interpretation." https://www.cochrane.org/news/statement-physical-interventions-interrupt-or-reduce-spread-respiratory-viruses-review https://www.cochrane.org/news/statement-physical-interventio...
- mike_hearn 3y ago
  Next sentence: "It would be accurate to say that the review examined whether interventions to promote mask wearing help to slow the spread of respiratory viruses, and that the results were inconclusive." ... which is what I just said: some people got mad at them because their review found no reliable evidence that masking worked (or rather, that mask mandates worked, but these are virtually the same thing). The null hypothesis for any medical intervention is that it has no effect. You start from that and then try to prove your hypothesis that it does have an effect, which is what medical studies are for. If you can't prove something works then we fall back to the null and assume it doesn't. So that isn't a misleading or inaccurate interpretation of the results, though it would certainly have been politically convenient for the Cochrane organization if their reviewers could have supported the claims of public health authorities.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - chowells 3y ago
    That sentence doesn't say what you think it says. It says "interventions to promote mask wearing". That's not mask wearing, it's telling people to wear masks. It is both true that wearing masks helps and that it's hard to tell if promoting mask-wearing changed enough behavior to matter. Mostly, those interventions do nothing.
    - krona 3y ago
      That's an ambiguous sentence. The main results of the study conclude: Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of influenza‐like illness (ILI)/COVID‐19 like illness compared to not wearing masks (risk ratio (RR) 0.95, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.84 to 1.09; 9 trials, 276,917 participants; moderate‐certainty evidence. Which I think is definitive.
      - renaudg 3y ago
        The original Plain Language Summary for this review stated that 'We are uncertain whether wearing masks or N95/P2 respirators helps to slow the spread of respiratory viruses based on the studies we assessed.' This wording was open to misinterpretation, for which we apologize.
  - renaudg 3y ago
    > no reliable evidence that masking worked(or rather, that mask mandates worked, but these are virtually the same thing). No it's not the same thing, and that's the key point. If you tell people that masking doesn't work (which is false) then of course mask mandates won't work because adherence will be low. A self-fulfilling prophecy really.
    - mike_hearn 3y ago
      Compliance for COVID mask mandates was measured and found to be extremely high, especially at the start (>95%). These mandates were enforced by harsh penalties so high compliance levels is no surprise. Thus you can't argue mask mandates didn't work because of low compliance. Also health authorities told people masks were highly effective. That's what justified the mandates. So you can't argue mask mandates didn't work because people were told it wouldn't work. Therefore there's no self fulfilling prophecy here. It didn't even matter what individuals thought anyway, we all had to wear masks. Although Cochrane much prefers to use RCTs, people have run regressions over the data and there was no link between levels of mask wearing and infection rates. It sucks but it appears that masks just can't stop aerosolized virus, which spreads like a gas. They aren't designed to do that so it's no knock against the manufacturers, who in some cases explicitly warned people that their products would be useless for that purpose (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EfNmzptXkAEg9Od?format=jpg&name=small https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EfNmzptXkAEg9Od?format=jpg&name=...).
- krona 3y ago
  Yes because a null hypothesis cannot be proven. Basic science.
  - dekhn 3y ago
    Nothing can be proven in science- only in math.
specialist 3y ago
> Also in recent times some people don't like them, because they did a big review of mask studies and found there was no reliable evidence that masks worked against COVID. Oh. I quickly found this: "The new scientific review on masks and Covid isn’t what you think" Kelsey Piper https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/2/22/23609499/masks-covid-coronavirus-cochrane-review-pandemic-science-studies-infection https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/2/22/23609499/masks-... Based on the criticisms, I expect Cochrane will revisit this topic. Progress isn't a straight line.
- b59831 3y ago
  Vox is an awful source.
  - tapland 3y ago
    In this case it's the source of nothing more than an explanation of the study which we are already discussing.
    - sfn42 3y ago
      "An explanation" can be wildly misleading. For example i might "explain" to you that clean code is about writing the least amount of code possible and you might start code golfing your production systems. If you want to know what the paper says, read the paper. Journalists are not scientists, most of them do not have the necessary knowledge to understand academic papers, nor do they have an incentive for doing it well. They do have an incentive for generating clicks though, generally by twisting the truth to make things sound more interesting or provoking than they are.
      - tapland 3y ago
        Exactly. My guess is the person making statements about the study that aren't supported by it to begin with also just read some bad explanations of it. This is not worse. Criticising widespread faulty "interpretations" and pointing out it doesn't say what all articles say seems way more likely to get someone to look at the source (especially when engaged in online arguments) instead of using articles to back their claims up.
renaudg 3y ago
> they did a big review of mask studies and found there was no reliable evidence that masks worked against COVID. No, that was a misinterpretation of the review in the Covid-skeptic sphere. Cochrane have had to issue a statement to clarify : https://www.cochrane.org/news/statement-physical-interventions-interrupt-or-reduce-spread-respiratory-viruses-review https://www.cochrane.org/news/statement-physical-interventio... tl;dr : half of the people given masks in these studies didn't wear them consistently or at all, dragging efficacy results down.
- db48x 3y ago
  Which is actually good proof that _requiring_ people to wear masks doesn’t help. Mask mandates are pointless even when masks are useful.
  - penultimatename 3y ago
    [flagged]
  - callalex 3y ago
    By that logic why make any laws? Why make murder illegal if some people are going to kill anyways?
    - readthenotes1 3y ago
      That is why we have police officers to try to stop the people who have proven they are willing to murder. Do you want to be the person going around policing mask wearing?
    - s1artibartfast 3y ago
      Three points. First, some laws probably don't have any positive impact. Second, there's a difference between accurately summarizing trial results and extrapolating that to the impact of a new law. If there was a death penalty for not wearing masks, perhaps compliance would be better than in the trials and an effect would be shown. This doesn't mean that the trial analysis is wrong, you just can't draw a conclusion about the law from the trial data. Third, laws have multiple purposes including Justice and Punishment. Some murderers might have zero chance of re-offending but we still want to punish them as a matter of Justice, not because it makes Society safer.

camelite 3y ago

"Many commentators have claimed that a recently-updated Cochrane Review shows that 'masks don't work', which is an inaccurate and misleading interpretation." https://www.cochrane.org/news/statement-physical-interventions-interrupt-or-reduce-spread-respiratory-viruses-review https://www.cochrane.org/news/statement-physical-interventio...

mike_hearn 3y ago
Next sentence: "It would be accurate to say that the review examined whether interventions to promote mask wearing help to slow the spread of respiratory viruses, and that the results were inconclusive." ... which is what I just said: some people got mad at them because their review found no reliable evidence that masking worked (or rather, that mask mandates worked, but these are virtually the same thing). The null hypothesis for any medical intervention is that it has no effect. You start from that and then try to prove your hypothesis that it does have an effect, which is what medical studies are for. If you can't prove something works then we fall back to the null and assume it doesn't. So that isn't a misleading or inaccurate interpretation of the results, though it would certainly have been politically convenient for the Cochrane organization if their reviewers could have supported the claims of public health authorities.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- chowells 3y ago
  That sentence doesn't say what you think it says. It says "interventions to promote mask wearing". That's not mask wearing, it's telling people to wear masks. It is both true that wearing masks helps and that it's hard to tell if promoting mask-wearing changed enough behavior to matter. Mostly, those interventions do nothing.
  - krona 3y ago
    That's an ambiguous sentence. The main results of the study conclude: Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of influenza‐like illness (ILI)/COVID‐19 like illness compared to not wearing masks (risk ratio (RR) 0.95, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.84 to 1.09; 9 trials, 276,917 participants; moderate‐certainty evidence. Which I think is definitive.
    - renaudg 3y ago
      The original Plain Language Summary for this review stated that 'We are uncertain whether wearing masks or N95/P2 respirators helps to slow the spread of respiratory viruses based on the studies we assessed.' This wording was open to misinterpretation, for which we apologize.
- renaudg 3y ago
  > no reliable evidence that masking worked(or rather, that mask mandates worked, but these are virtually the same thing). No it's not the same thing, and that's the key point. If you tell people that masking doesn't work (which is false) then of course mask mandates won't work because adherence will be low. A self-fulfilling prophecy really.
  - mike_hearn 3y ago
    Compliance for COVID mask mandates was measured and found to be extremely high, especially at the start (>95%). These mandates were enforced by harsh penalties so high compliance levels is no surprise. Thus you can't argue mask mandates didn't work because of low compliance. Also health authorities told people masks were highly effective. That's what justified the mandates. So you can't argue mask mandates didn't work because people were told it wouldn't work. Therefore there's no self fulfilling prophecy here. It didn't even matter what individuals thought anyway, we all had to wear masks. Although Cochrane much prefers to use RCTs, people have run regressions over the data and there was no link between levels of mask wearing and infection rates. It sucks but it appears that masks just can't stop aerosolized virus, which spreads like a gas. They aren't designed to do that so it's no knock against the manufacturers, who in some cases explicitly warned people that their products would be useless for that purpose (https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EfNmzptXkAEg9Od?format=jpg&name=small https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EfNmzptXkAEg9Od?format=jpg&name=...).
krona 3y ago
Yes because a null hypothesis cannot be proven. Basic science.
- dekhn 3y ago
  Nothing can be proven in science- only in math.

specialist 3y ago

> Also in recent times some people don't like them, because they did a big review of mask studies and found there was no reliable evidence that masks worked against COVID. Oh. I quickly found this: "The new scientific review on masks and Covid isn’t what you think" Kelsey Piper https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/2/22/23609499/masks-covid-coronavirus-cochrane-review-pandemic-science-studies-infection https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/2/22/23609499/masks-... Based on the criticisms, I expect Cochrane will revisit this topic. Progress isn't a straight line.

b59831 3y ago
Vox is an awful source.
- tapland 3y ago
  In this case it's the source of nothing more than an explanation of the study which we are already discussing.
  - sfn42 3y ago
    "An explanation" can be wildly misleading. For example i might "explain" to you that clean code is about writing the least amount of code possible and you might start code golfing your production systems. If you want to know what the paper says, read the paper. Journalists are not scientists, most of them do not have the necessary knowledge to understand academic papers, nor do they have an incentive for doing it well. They do have an incentive for generating clicks though, generally by twisting the truth to make things sound more interesting or provoking than they are.
    - tapland 3y ago
      Exactly. My guess is the person making statements about the study that aren't supported by it to begin with also just read some bad explanations of it. This is not worse. Criticising widespread faulty "interpretations" and pointing out it doesn't say what all articles say seems way more likely to get someone to look at the source (especially when engaged in online arguments) instead of using articles to back their claims up.

renaudg 3y ago

> they did a big review of mask studies and found there was no reliable evidence that masks worked against COVID. No, that was a misinterpretation of the review in the Covid-skeptic sphere. Cochrane have had to issue a statement to clarify : https://www.cochrane.org/news/statement-physical-interventions-interrupt-or-reduce-spread-respiratory-viruses-review https://www.cochrane.org/news/statement-physical-interventio... tl;dr : half of the people given masks in these studies didn't wear them consistently or at all, dragging efficacy results down.

db48x 3y ago
Which is actually good proof that _requiring_ people to wear masks doesn’t help. Mask mandates are pointless even when masks are useful.
- penultimatename 3y ago
  [flagged]
- callalex 3y ago
  By that logic why make any laws? Why make murder illegal if some people are going to kill anyways?
  - readthenotes1 3y ago
    That is why we have police officers to try to stop the people who have proven they are willing to murder. Do you want to be the person going around policing mask wearing?
  - s1artibartfast 3y ago
    Three points. First, some laws probably don't have any positive impact. Second, there's a difference between accurately summarizing trial results and extrapolating that to the impact of a new law. If there was a death penalty for not wearing masks, perhaps compliance would be better than in the trials and an effect would be shown. This doesn't mean that the trial analysis is wrong, you just can't draw a conclusion about the law from the trial data. Third, laws have multiple purposes including Justice and Punishment. Some murderers might have zero chance of re-offending but we still want to punish them as a matter of Justice, not because it makes Society safer.