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Can we all just acknowledge how weird the debate has gotten though? I mean clearly some types of masks are better than others, that's why there's standards for

Can we all just acknowledge how weird the debate has gotten though? I mean clearly some types of masks are better than others, that's why there's standards for masks in the first place. This shouldn't be controversial. Worse by making it controversial the whole notion of doubting any kind of mask no matter how ill designed suddenly became a faux-pass. Severely obstructing any debate on the best way to make masks. Heck as the article points out surgical masks (not designed to prevent infection from respiratory disease) only block around 70%. Chances are some people now want to shout how 70% is still a lot but 70% fewer particles is a whole lot different from a 70% lower chance of infection. We could all have cooperated to figure out the best way to make masks, but somehow the debate was so heavily leaning towards whether masks were at all effective (which as you pointed out is really fucking obvious), that any notion of debating which masks were most effective and in which contexts was interpreted as a way to delegitimize masks as whole. Edit: And really the lazy attempts to cast doubt on the effectiveness of masks should have been recognized as disingenuous. The idea that no masks work is easily dismissed because we've been testing and designing masks for all kinds of purposes for ages, so at best it is an argument for a higher class of mask, never no mask at all.

legitster 2y ago
I hear ya, I'm with ya on every single point. Except... I would stake my fortune that the difference between 70% effectiveness and 99% effectiveness in a monitored study is going to be reduced into a rounding error in the real world. There are so many factors to control for when it comes to how they get used, how good they fit, how much they trap moisture over a long day, how much their performance degrades, etc. For the purpose of preventing most incidental exposures, I would think that at the end of the day anything that prevents direct airflow is going to perform practically the same. In my case, I was exclusively using N95s when I caught Covid back in the day, and it was probably for a myriad of ways that I was using the mask wrong or making other bad choices. The mask itself being 99% effective probably didn't significantly change my odds when I had to wear it 14 hours a day.
- contravariant 2y ago
  Well there's also the issue of range, those 30% of particles might well have far less velocity. Which might be all that you need in a well ventilated area, or might be a meaningless difference in a busy room. Frankly I don't know, and I don't mind admitting I don't know. What worries me greatly though is that at some point saying you didn't know was misconstrued as an attack on ideology. I mean if I had to guess I'd go for something blocking 99% of the viruses at least 70% of the time over something blocking 70% of the particles at least 99% of the time. Of course it depends, but one of those works to some extent at least 70% of the time, while for the other it is unclear. But really it depends. If we're talking about umbrellas those two scenarios result in you getting roughly equally wet, yet if we're talking about bullet proof shields I'd take my chances with the shield stopping most bullets at least some of the time over the one stopping only 2 out of 3 bullets.
bongodongobob 2y ago
What debate? That masks help? Only fools think they don't.

legitster 2y ago

I hear ya, I'm with ya on every single point. Except... I would stake my fortune that the difference between 70% effectiveness and 99% effectiveness in a monitored study is going to be reduced into a rounding error in the real world. There are so many factors to control for when it comes to how they get used, how good they fit, how much they trap moisture over a long day, how much their performance degrades, etc. For the purpose of preventing most incidental exposures, I would think that at the end of the day anything that prevents direct airflow is going to perform practically the same. In my case, I was exclusively using N95s when I caught Covid back in the day, and it was probably for a myriad of ways that I was using the mask wrong or making other bad choices. The mask itself being 99% effective probably didn't significantly change my odds when I had to wear it 14 hours a day.

contravariant 2y ago
Well there's also the issue of range, those 30% of particles might well have far less velocity. Which might be all that you need in a well ventilated area, or might be a meaningless difference in a busy room. Frankly I don't know, and I don't mind admitting I don't know. What worries me greatly though is that at some point saying you didn't know was misconstrued as an attack on ideology. I mean if I had to guess I'd go for something blocking 99% of the viruses at least 70% of the time over something blocking 70% of the particles at least 99% of the time. Of course it depends, but one of those works to some extent at least 70% of the time, while for the other it is unclear. But really it depends. If we're talking about umbrellas those two scenarios result in you getting roughly equally wet, yet if we're talking about bullet proof shields I'd take my chances with the shield stopping most bullets at least some of the time over the one stopping only 2 out of 3 bullets.

bongodongobob 2y ago

What debate? That masks help? Only fools think they don't.