If you go to FactCheck.org or just Google "The Evolving Science of Face Masks and COVID-19" we can find a fair conclusion on the effectiveness of mask wearing to reduce the risk of developing or spreading the Covid-19 virus. They tell it like it is, of course if someone is still hung up on a mask infringing on their rights I guess it doesn't matter to them anyway.
If you go to FactCheck.org or just Google "The Evolving Science of Face Masks and COVID-19" we can find a fair conclusion on the effectiveness of mask wearing to reduce the risk of developing or spreading the Covid-19 virus.
Is it in any way surprising left wing organizations like factcheck.org declare that their initiatives work? You treat factcheck.org like it is some scientific orgnization - it was created to ensure that the left could define "fact" how they chose. And make people who know nothing about it sound like they know what they are talking about, in their endearingly sanctimious/self-righteous way.
NO studies before about March 2020 found that wearing a randomly-chosen mask, and that alone, was effective in slowing or preventing the spread of a virus - any virus, Wuhan Flu is not consequentially different - and that was how even the sainted Fauci started out. He wasn't lying to help Trump. He wrote an article for JAMA indicating exactly that. Starting in March, a spew of "studies" said wearing masks as a great idea came out, when the left switched from "trying to suppress the spread is racist", to "Trump is killing you!!!!!!" He of course fell in line and changed, presto-chango, despite the fact that there were no studies due to lack of time and lack of any process controls in a few months.
Cut to July-ish when there HAD been enough time to do such a study. No clinical difference in the occurrence or severity wearing a mask. That was available for about a day, until the outcry from the left caused it to be taken down as "dangerous". I linked to it here. Dangerous to what? People offering a worthless non-solution "solution" to curry political favor. Since, of course, everyone involved got the message, say the wrong thing and you are getting cancelled.
This is an absolutely *textbook* and blatantly obvious case of manipulating "science" and political organizations deciding to define "fact" to their own ends and using the means available to give the ignorant. Compare to this hypothesis:
March 2020- We have a new virus with no known significant immunity. We are doing more-or-less nothing useful to retard the spread (and can't, in any practical sense), so the number of deaths will be .1-.15% of the exposed population - the assumed death rate per exposure in April 2020, minus a few who hunker down in nearly complete isolation. 330,000,000*.001 = 330,000, knock that down to 300,000 to cover outliers. 330,000,000*.0015 = 495,000. Figure a year for a vaccine has any significant effect, so predict 300,000 - 500,000 dead.
Cut to March 2021 - actual dead 529,000 and rapidly diminishing with minimal effects of vaccination. That represents a 5% error in the original death rate per exposure
.16% VS .15%. In reality, figure that the exposure is not 100%, and the actual death rate per exposure is more like .17-.18% - which is in fact consistent with the other known statistics. So, in the first few weeks it was possible to predict the effects within single-digit percentages.
That is actual science, data science in this case. And in fact, it probably takes about that long to make any reasonable study. It presumes that masks do nothing at all, along with all the other silly "solutions" offered. Isolation *does* work, people in at-risk populations should (or at this point, should have, since it is past-tense) isolate to the maximum extent possible, people under 60 should probably just go on with their lives, get a bad cold for a week, and go on with life. And don't bother posting anecdotal "well, a 18 year old got it and DIED". That is a statistical anomaly, and the entire premise includes *random error*, that is, for all intents and purposes, luck (chaos...).
Brett