Coronavirus Update 12

Arizona patriots protesting in May against the tyranny 

and horror of social defenses against COVID-19

The New York Times reports on data from various experiments and anecdotal observations strongly suggesting that wearing a face mask could have two major beneficial effects for the mask wearer.

• First, wearing a mask appears to reduce the number of new COVID-19 infections in uninfected people compared to people who do not wear a mask

• Second, wearing a mask appears to reduce the number of viruses uninfected people take in and that postulated reduced virus dose (inoculum) appears to correlate with new infections being both significantly milder and less commonly lethal

Those two tentative hypotheses are not backed by enough evidence to make them proven to the normal standard of statistical confidence for ‘proven’ conclusions concerning infectious diseases. Nonetheless, evidence from various kinds of experiments and observations all strongly suggest that both of these observations are in fact true.

The evidence

At a basic level, common sense suggests that the first benefit is very likely true. That is because infected people who wear masks have been proven to reduce the number of uninfected people they infect. The only way to explain that is to postulate that masks trap some of the viruses that infected people shed into the air. If that is true, and it undoubtedly is, then there is no reason to believe that a mask an uninfected person is wearing would not also trap some viruses in the air, thereby reducing the virus dose and the likelihood of becoming infected.

If that reasoning is sound, then it also suggests that the second benefit is might also true. Some evidence indicates that lower COVID-19 doses tend to lead to less severe disease.

Experiments with animals indicate that when cages are separated by face mask material compared to no mask material, the transmission rate from infected animals in one cage to uninfected animals  in the adjacent cage dropped significantly.

The NYT writes:

“Some indirect data has been accumulating from people as well. Researchers have tentatively estimated that about 40 percent of coronavirus infections do not produce any symptoms. But when some people wear masks, the proportion of asymptomatic cases seems to skyrocket, reportedly surpassing 90 percent during one outbreak at a seafood plant in Oregon. Wearing a face covering doesn’t make people impervious to infection, but these trends of asymptomatic cases could suggest that masks lead to milder disease, potentially reducing hospitalizations and deaths.

Particularly compelling, Dr. Gandhi said, is the data from cruise ships, which pack big groups of people into close quarters. More than 80 percent of those infected aboard Japan’s Diamond Princess in February — before masking had become common practice — came down with symptoms, she noted. But on another vessel that left Argentina in March, and on which all passengers were issued surgical masks after someone onboard came down with a fever, the level of symptomatic cases was below 20 percent. 

The idea that face coverings can curb disease severity, although not yet proven, ‘makes complete sense’, said Linsey Marr, an expert in virus transmission at Virginia Tech. ‘It’s another good argument for wearing masks.’”

Once again, all of this points to at least two unhappy things. First, wearing a mask during the pandemic should have nothing to do with politics in any way. The fact that it is political for tens of millions of Americans shows an unforgivable failure of political leadership mostly (~90%) by the president, the GOP in congress and some GOP governors and state politicians. Instead of being politically neutral, our self-centered narcissist president and some (most?) GOP politicians are simply incapable of dealing rationally with the pandemic.[1] Their ideology betrays and blinds their minds to reality and reason.

Second, the presidential and GOP failure in putting politics over science and rationality has needlessly cost tens of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars. All of these people should be impeached, removed from office, prosecuted for criminal negligence, fined into bankruptcy and imprisoned for at least 15 years. After all, that is just being fair and balanced.

Footnote: 

1. A NYT article today describes a planned school reopening in Georgia: “In-person classes without a mask requirement are scheduled to begin on Friday in Jefferson, worrying some parents, students and teachers as the state confronts the coronavirus. .... An online petition created by two Jefferson High seniors calling for a mandatory-mask rule has garnered more than 600 signatures. But a competing petition demanding that masks remain a choice for students has attracted more than 200 signers, some of whom have left comments that underscore the politicized nature of the disagreement. ‘Only liberals can get rona and I’m not a liberal’, wrote one, using a slang term for the coronavirus. ‘TRUMP2020 no mask fo me.’”

In some places, the politics of COVID-19 has gone from merely grossly incompetent to stupid and literally lethal. The rigid ideology and savage tribalism of most of conservative and populist American politics is mostly responsible for this colossal stupidity and the misery, deaths and costs it imposes on everyone. The ideologues who instigate this sort of anti-mask stupidity are responsible for the consequences of their acts.

Some of these patriots are going to get their wish -- 

unfortunately, they are going to kill some innocents as they 

joyfully exercise their freedom to live and die free 

(that freedom includes the freedom to kill innocents via stupid behavior)

STUPID BEHAVIOR KILLS