i haven’t read the article, but it is saying those flimsy plastic disposable surgical masks are somehow better than cloth masks? if so, i’ll totally ditch the cloth masks for it. the plastic surgical masks are easier to breathe in. didn’t realize they were better.
I’ve been thinking of starting a thread on masks, but I guess I’ll just post the tl;dr here – I’ve recently discovered KF94 masks, the Korean rated masks. They are affordable, light, easy to fit, and play well with glasses. They are probably nearly as good as an N95, especially if you haven’t had your N95 professionally fitted, and I find them a whole lot easier to wear.
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Yeah, they are better than cloth masks unless the cloth mask has a serious filter. Like, the VOGmask has a very good filter. But it’s harder to breath through than a surgical mask.
The major issue with surgical masks is that they leak around the edges. The major issue with cloth masks is that they don’t contain an effective filter. I’ve read you can approximate the best of both worlds by wearing a snug cloth mask over a surgical mask.
So Marcie is advocating for more mask mandates but with better masks.
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i’ve barely read this thread, but that’s what I’m getting from all this. I need to stock up on surgical masks.
I thought you did start one? wasn’t there one where you posted the “study” showing mask mandates “worked” in Jena, Germany, but then no one else really posted there?
ETA here: Masks
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I don’t think it makes the point you think I think it makes. 
I had posted the study when I saw it, but then I wrote a whole paragraph on why it’s more apples-to-oranges than I would like to see, which is disappointing to me – not because it does or doesn’t make a certain point, but because (as I realized as I thought about it more last night) the two metrics of comparison are too different to really make any point. Better studies needed.
That said, I would rate this statement of yours “mostly true” in terms of what this study looked at:
in light of the research that “covid hospitalization” numbers may be vastly overstated for children.
(“Need hospitalization” is likely generally more serious than “diagnosed with myocarditis” but “hospitalized with covid” does not mean “hospitalized due to covid” up to almost half the time.)
There all sorts of other confounding variables, such as population density, age distribution, etc.
These naive comparisons are nonsensical. They are also used to try to make arguments about mask effectiveness in the US.
You are not being consistent when you criticize a good study for not being sufficiently randomized or baselined in one hand, but then hold forth these naive comparisons of overall infection or death rate in the other.
You’re selective skepticism is destroying your objectivity.
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You want to talk about “selective skepticism” while holding up the hopelessly confounded Bangladesh tire fire as “a good study”? Population density has been shown not to be a significant confounder for this disease. Age distribution is likely a big confounder for death statistics - I haven’t looked at this but do Sweden and Germany have significantly different age distributions?
Which do you think is more applicable to making arguments about mask mandates in the US - mask mandates in Germany, or a study of mask promotion in Bangladesh?
It’s not a good study.
I fully admit these are not controlled research studies - these charts are purely illustrative. I’m open and have been open to look at any good evidence you’re willing to share that masks actually work - anywhere in the world. If they have a significant effect that should be apparent somewhere, right? All I’ve seen to support are largely cherry-picked dates that don’t hold up or equally hopelessly confounded comparisons. However, there are many, many examples where masks were imposed with no effect whatsoever. I realize these are more correlation and can’t prove causation, but if something is causative, there’d have to be a heck of a lot of confounding to hide any correlation, wouldn’t you say, Mr. Gorilla?
Good study to me means it effectively communicates what it measured and what it does not. People can then use that study in appropriate ways or not. As an example, I think that study you mentioned earlier looks good, but i think you are using it poorly.
I don’t know for sure that bangladesh study is good. I am making an assumption because it appears to have been done by competent people, and nothing you have said about it is convincing to me otherwise. But I would not personally vouch for it beyond that.
I consider the problems with those straight comparisons to be glaring.
Instead of speculating about what is and is not a confounding variable there should be a systematic observational study of whether masks work. Which, all else equal, will still be inferior to a randomized study, ie the bangladesh study. It’s as if you would find less to criticize if only the bangladesh study were simply a figure on twitter.
Correlation does not prove causation is something social scientists say because they have no established theory to underlying their studies (not because they are less smart, but because people change their behavior.) I’ve never heard anybody say that about a physics observational study for example. Instead in the natural sciences one turns to theory.
A lot of this mask behavior is biology. I posted studies already that had theory based tests of how masks are biologically thought to work. It also linked to various measurements of effectiveness which have to be considered along with the biological theory.
We also have the simple fact that N95 masks clearly work for healthcare professionals.
You seem to want some kind of smoking gun that is usually shown in text books on settled science but is very rare in developing scientific knowledge. And it can be hard to recognize when it appears (for example in climate science it is arguably ocean temperatures, not surface temperatures or ice cores which get all the press.) It is leading you to the wrong conclusions.
I mean, think about your specialty. Would you listen to graphs by twitter posters ?
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And heck, surgical masks also clearly work. I can’t find the study at the moment, but when Boston had its big surge at the start of the pandemic, and all the hospitals were full, a couple of hospitals nonetheless managed to get enough masks for everyone, and required them to be worn. And their staff had a lower incidence of COVID than the local population at large, despite massively higher exposure.
Biden is set to mandate either vaccine or testing for all companies with 100 or more employees.
Biden to announce new vaccine mandates that could cover 100 million Americans - CNNPolitics
I’m pro-vaccine, and pro-companies choosing to implement vaccine mandates as they wish, or sports stadiums implementing them, etc. But this feels like too much of government overreach to me.
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Huh, i… Agree with you.
I thought he was just mandating it for federal govt employees and contractors. And i support that. I don’t support requiring every large employer to require vaccination, though.
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Just saw that news item myself. I am pretty much in line with you here.
I do not like a government vaccine mandate. I feel like corporations really lobbied for this one so they could shift the outrage from themselves making the decision to the govt.
This is the kind of thing that ‘sticks’. Like once the government has the power they never let it go. It sets a bad precedent in my eyes. Say you support the Biden government and the vaccine, okay this seems like a good idea no big deal. But then Trump gets elected in 2024 and has these stupid ideas like you can’t get an abortion if you work for a large company or something. I dunno, I haven’t thought this through obviously, but it kind of scares me.
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I assumed that he was doing it for 100+ employers that had federal contracts based on the headlines — is that not the case? If he’s trying to do it via OSHA or something for ALL employers, that seems like massive overreach.
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From what I can see from other articles, Federal employees and those with federal contracts will not have the “weekly testing” option but must be vaccinated. ALL other 100+ employers will have to either be vaccinated or tested weekly. Done via OSHA.
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What I’ve seen is that he’s doing it via Dept of Labor & OSHA.
I guess we’ll hear from the horse’s mouth in about 15 minutes or so… 
Biden to announce new vaccine mandates that could cover 100 million Americans - CNNPolitics
The President will direct the Labor Department to require all businesses with 100 or more employees ensure their workers are either vaccinated or tested once a week. Companies could face thousands of dollars in fines per employee if they don’t comply.
Biden plans to sign an executive order requiring all government employees be vaccinated against Covid-19, with no option of being regularly tested to opt out. The President will also sign an order directing the same standard be applied to employees of contractors who do business with the federal government.
He will require that 300,000 educators in federal Head Start programs be vaccinated and will call on governors to require vaccinations for schoolteachers and staff.
And he will require the 17 million health care workers at facilities receiving funds from Medicare and Medicaid to be fully vaccinated, expanding the mandate to hospitals, home care facilities and dialysis centers around the country.
And what Marcie said, I suppose we’ll know for sure, soon.