Very lengthy, heavily referenced article re masks, with brief mention of the "distancing" (lack of) evidence (all baseless unscientific speculation).
There is evidence at least 20 years old (and six months old) from high quality randomized controlled trials (in the real world) that masks do not decrease the rate of transmission of viruses. It's plain and simple. The question then becomes, why is the government bureaucracy lying and being bolstered by the mainstream media? Since they know that masks and mask mandates are useless, what is the goal of mandating masks and promoting lies about them and the necessity for every citizen to wear one at all times?
https://www.aier.org/article/masking-a-careful-review-of-the-evidence/Masking: A Careful Review of the EvidenceThe question on whether to wear a face mask or not during the Covid-19 pandemic remains emotional and contentious. Why? This question about the utility of face coverings (which has taken on a talisman-like life) is now overwrought with steep politicization regardless of political affiliation (e.g. republican or liberal/democrat).
Importantly, the evidence just is and was not there to support mask use for asymptomatic people to stop viral spread during a pandemic. While the evidence may seem conflicted, the evidence (including the peer-reviewed evidence) actually does not support its use and leans heavily toward masks having no significant impact in stopping spread of the Covid virus.
In fact, it is not unreasonable at this time to conclude that surgical and cloth masks, used as they currently are, have absolutely no impact on controlling the transmission of Covid-19 virus, and current evidence implies that face masks can be actually harmful. All this to say and as so comprehensively documented by Dr. Roger W. Koops in a recent American Institute of Economic Research (AIER) publication, there is no clear scientific evidence that masks (surgical or cloth) work to mitigate risk to the wearer or to those coming into contact with the wearer, as they are currently worn in everyday life and specifically as we refer to Covid-19.
We present the evidence in full below. We also state that should adequate evidence emerge that supports the effectiveness of surgical and cloth masks in this Covid pandemic (or any similar type masks), then we will change our position and conclude otherwise. Our focus is on face masks for Covid but we will touch gently on the issue of school closures and lockdowns, as these three issues remain the key public health policy catastrophes we have faced as global societies.
...
And we reiterate that our conclusions are not based on the absence of evidence for ineffectiveness alone, but actual evidence of ineffectiveness.
...
Our view is that masks as they are worn now, and the masks that are in use, offer zero protection. They can be viewed as ineffective while others consider them as being better than nothing but without evidence to support that view. Masks are not sealed properly to the face and do not effectively stop virion penetration. We state emphatically that public health policy, or any policy for that matter, must be undergirded by sound data and evidence. As we have said, the reality is that widespread use of masks is not supported by science and in fact just the opposite. This mask hysteria is driving unnecessary fear in the population and must end. Those who deliver statements relentlessly on the use of masks are doing so without the luxury of any credible evidence to support those views. They speak on assumption or speculation and this is not science! However, it is important to understand that as we await definitive research, given the situation and the desire to prevent spread to higher-risk persons (e.g. elderly), when consistent social distancing is not possible (our previous concerns about distancing notwithstanding), and out of an abundance of caution, face coverings among symptomatic individuals might reduce the spread of droplets with SARS-CoV-2 infection to others.
...
Danish reporting of a higher-quality mask study on Covid and masks that was actually rejected or sidelined by top journals including Lancet, New England Journal of Medicine, and the American Association’s JAMA is alarming if true and suggests a pattern of politicization of research and of the medical community, journal editors and the peer-reviewers. We look forward to its future publication.
Conclusion
In closing, perhaps Yinon Weiss, who is a U.S. military veteran, and who holds a degree in bioengineering from U.C. Berkeley, captures our current face mask calamity by reminding us how masks constrain our return to a more normal life. As outlandish as this might seem could this be the aim of those using the pandemic for the purpose of advancing various political ideologies? Masking drives fear in the population and a perennial sense of ‘illness’ that is crippling. As stated eloquently by Weiss, “Our universal use of unscientific face coverings is therefore closer to medieval superstition than it is to science, but many powerful institutions have too much political capital invested in the mask narrative at this point, so the dogma is perpetuated.”
Our paper sought to examine the complete and most updated mask-related scientific evidence, along with anecdotal data and reports. Our current belief remains that asymptomatic individuals do not drive the pandemic and that the time-tested method of Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis of washing hands remains the best-established mechanism of limiting most microbial infections. People with symptomatic disease should not go into work! Unfortunately, since the economic downturn around 2008, the incidence of ‘presenteeism’ has increased due to the fear of losing one’s job if one does not show up to work, even if ill. This behaviour has to be taken very seriously and must be stopped.
We also agree with the words of Klompas in the NEJM publication: “What is clear, however, is that universal masking alone is not a panacea. A mask will not protect providers caring for a patient with active Covid-19 if it’s not accompanied by meticulous hand hygiene, eye protection, gloves, and a gown. A mask alone will not prevent health care workers with early Covid-19 from contaminating their hands and spreading the virus to patients and colleagues. Focusing on universal masking alone may, paradoxically, lead to more transmission of Covid-19 if it diverts attention from implementing more fundamental infection-control measures.”
In sum, when we look at the science, there is emerging and troubling evidence of harms from mask use in the absence of any benefits. This is also related to things as mundane as simple incorrect use of masking, as well as the development of complacency that emerges due to mask use and thus the relaxation of other mitigation steps, as well as mask contamination.
We also cannot discount the possible harms on our immune systems and general health from such constant and prolonged use of masks, given we have never done this before. We are in uncharted territory and especially so with the possible implications for our children. Their immune systems are still being developed and we are forcing lockdowns, school closures, and masking on a developing child and we have no prior experience on the subsequent outcomes pertaining to children’s development, health, and well-being.
Most discomforting is that those government bureaucrats in charge and particularly the ‘medical experts’ continue to fail to admit they were exceptionally incorrect with regard to most of what they have stated in terms of pandemic policies and response related to the Covid pandemic. They have harmed the very societies they are supposed to help protect. They have failed to look at the evidence or follow it, and continue to operate in an arbitrary nonscientific, nonevidence informed manner. They ‘attack,’ with the assistance of the mass media, those of us who question their policies and actions despite the disastrous outcomes of those public health policies. Indeed, we are often blamed for the failures (called ‘deniers’ or ‘heretics’) and crushing harms of all of their policies when it has actually been their specious, illogical, and unsound actions and recommendations that deserve public outcry.