I fully support anyone’s choice to wear a mask.
I wear a mask now when I’m feeling off.
I strongly oppose any renewed mandate, and this feels like a litmus test.
I think saying “I support anyone’s choice to wear a mask” is as ridiculous as saying “I support anyone’s choice to wear a coat when it’s cold.”
1 Like
I’ll nitpick that claim a little. I think in certain settings, particularly banks, prior to Covid masks were actively discouraged for security purposes. They want your face on camera so they can identify you if you commit a crime.
My bank had a sign forbidding sunglasses… I can’t imagine how many heads would have exploded if I would have walked in wearing a surgical mask in 2019. I think the sign said something like “sunglasses, ski masks and other face coverings are prohibited”.
I mean, what about people who wear a hijab for religious reasons and a mask for public health reasons? My guess is that the bank probably isn’t going to turn that person away.
I asked about that one time and they said that women in hijabs are to either use the ATM or make an appointment to speak with a female employee in private (where they are allowed to take their mask off).
I didn’t ask about the public health thing, but pre-Covid I very much doubt they would have made an exception for that. ATM or conduct business over the phone / internet / mail.
Fyi, i wore something like that for Halloween. Remember when Marcie used to talk about how masks are a fall hazard because they cut off your field of view? That’s bullshit for surgical masks and the N95 masks i wear. But it’s a huge issue with that number. I was afraid I’d kill myself going down my front steps.
For what?
I don’t see the harm in pushing for a recommendation if several viruses are all spreading.
If the majority want a mandate should politicians not consider that in their policy?
If society spend two years trying to suppress a respiratory virus, it is not surprising to have an uptick in respiratory viruses once mitigation is removed. It also seems like starting with the least expensive mitigation measure to prevent resource capacity issues is not unreasonable.
Agree.
Not quite. There’s antibodies given to high risk babies like preemies but no current vaccine.
I get Snik opposes a mask mandate. I don’t see one returning to even blue areas in the US. However I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask society to be temporarily inconvenienced for the benefit of society, like rolling blackouts or reduced speeds in school zones.
I’d be very cautious if I had a young baby at home. They have very small airways and sick babies struggle to eat and breathe at the same time. Shit can go bad real quick.
You know it won’t but some of the let it rip & anti-vax people have an idyllic vision of the past. If hospital capacity (space, staff, equipment, medication) is strained, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to ask society to try to reduce that strain. I don’t know about Canada, but margins can be very thin at US hospitals. This was part of the using garbage bags as PPE in the beginning because of “just in time” ordering of supplies.
Disagree.
RSV isn’t new. What’s new is kids went several years without being exposed to it, so are now more likely to need medical care.
Flu is harder to say for sure, but very likely similar.
For return to a mandate.
Remember Ontario has had a lot stricter measures than the US this whole time.
Sure consider it, and expect push back.
But where else is RSV up, and were they serious about masking?
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/health/what-is-rsv-and-why-is-it-surging-across-the-u-s
This article suggests RSV is high “across the US” and blames masking. I have not seen anything that shows that it’s higher where masking was enforced vs where it was not.
And this one sort of makes my point that it wasn’t masking alone, but all the things people were doing to avoid illness that impacted both flu and RSV in the community.
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2022/10/26/health/rsv-immunity-gap/index.html
Tldr:
So the people who washed hands and disinfected surfaces, who wore masks and kept their distance from others, did more than stop the spread of the coronavirus.
“Those interventions, while they were great at limiting the spread of Covid-19, they also did a really good job of limiting the spread of other respiratory diseases such as RSV and influenza,” Baker said.
So basically, now that people aren’t avoiding people, more kids are getting sick. Some of these kids would have gotten sick in 2021 or 2020 if they had been around people.
That’s a weird use of the term litmus test and not what I was expecting, but OK.
I don’t think this is right.
More kids need medical care in 2022. Because the virus has a broader population that has not had it, due to two seasons without much of it at all. I think the same kid that needs medical care now would have needed it in 2020 or 2021 if they caught RSV.
Masks could help prevent the need to ration medical care for kids.
Masking is a factor, but not the only factor. Framing the discussion as “We had to wear masks, therefore more kids are sick from RSV” is a gross oversimplification.
2 Likes