Public health experts now admit what the empirical and scientific evidence has shown all along: cloth masks don’t work.
Like a bad dream that won’t go away, our public health experts’ unhealthy mask fetish continues, albeit with an important qualification:
Public health experts now acknowledge that cloth masks—which they foisted upon the American people for at least the first 18 months of this pandemic—don’t stop or slow the the spread of viral respiratory infections.
“I wish we’d get rid of the term masking,” adds Michael Osterholm, Director of Infectious Disease, Research and Policy, at the University of Minnesota. “Because, in fact, it implies anything you put in front of your face works…
We know today that many of the face cloth coverings that people wear are not very effective in reducing any of the virus movement in or out—either [that] you’re breathing out or you’re breathing in.
Mr. Osterholm made those comments more than five months ago, Aug. 2, 2021; and Dr. Wen’s comments were recorded by CNN three weeks ago.
CDC. Yet, only three days ago (Fri., Jan. 14, 2022), did the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) finally acknowledge (sort of) this empirical, scientific reality.
I say sort of because the CDC still refuses to acknowledge that the efficacy of cloth masks has not been demonstrated in any real-world population setting (as opposed to an artificial laboratory setting). “Masking,” asserts the CDC
is a critical public health tool for preventing spread of COVID-19, and it is important to remember that any mask is better than no mask.
Historical Evidence. This is simply not true, as even mask fetishists Mr. Osterholm and Dr. Wen readily acknowledge. And while cloth masks are even less effective against the more contagious and fast-spreading Omicron variant, their utility against any respiratory virus, COVID included, is sorely lacking.
“More than a century after the 1918 influenza pandemic,” write researchers from the Cato Institute,
examination of the efficacy of masks has produced a large volume of mostly low- to moderate-quality evidence that has largely failed to demonstrate their value in most settings.
“COVID is so dangerous,” notes Cato’s Thomas A. Firey, “that masking doesn’t provide much benefit—and cotton masks seem to provide no benefit at all.”
In short, the evidence is clear, consistent, and definitive: cloth masks don’t work. They don’t stop or slow the spread of viral respiratory infections. Let’s end the charade and give up the fetish—and let’s focus, instead, on things that really do work: vaccines, social distancing, and therapeutics.
Feature photo credit: Screen shots of Dr. Leana Wen and Michael Osterholm from the PBS News Hour and CSPAN, respectively.