1036 replies to this topic

[gamesguru]

Masks definitely do work in varying degrees.  Anyone who interpreted my posts otherwise is a victim of misunderstandings.

 

It's not a contradiction.  We're just uncertain how effective different masks are.  Too many variables and not enough data.  Highlighting that uncertainty isn't a contradiction, but rather an expression of the sublime. One must entertain all possibilities, even those that are not.

 

I would wager money on the side that even surgical masks (worn consistently) mitigate spread to a measurable extent (given sufficient data).

 

And that's fine.  I'm not an intellectual, just a guy on reddit. You're the one who's read more philosophy. You're the more learned. Take the title, you want it.

[Hip]

Good to see that you are quoting reputable scientific journals, osris. 

 

Your sources are reputable, however, I am not sure they are applicable to the coronavirus pandemic, as I will explain below.

 

 

 

Jacobs, J. L. et al. (2009) “Use of surgical face masks to reduce the incidence of the common cold among health care workers in Japan: A randomized controlled trial,” See: American Journal of Infection Control, Volume 37, Issue 5, 417 – 419. https://www.ncbi.nlm...pubmed/19216002

 

This study is not applicable to coronavirus transmission:

 

Pathogens can be divided into airborne and non-airborne types. Airborne means that small globules of respiratory secretions (saliva or mucus) containing the pathogen can float in the air for many minutes or hours and can infect people; whereas non-airborne means the pathogen may be ejected from a person's mouth or nose in a larger globule and infect people, but being heavier it quickly falls to the ground, and does not linger in the air.

 

Airborne globules can have a range of tens of meters; but heavier globules quickly fall to the floor within a meter or two (unless the person sneezes or coughs, in which case these heavier globules can get ejected across a longer distance).

 

Why are some pathogens airborne and others non-airborne?

 

Well, if a pathogens is very infectious even in tiny amounts, then even the small amounts contained in the smaller airborne globules are enough to seed a new infection when they enter an uninfected person's mouth or nose. Whereas if a pathogen in less infectious, then there may not be enough pathogen within these smaller airborne globules to seed a new infection, and in which case, the pathogen will not be transmitted via the airborne route. It is only the larger non-airborne globules that contain enough pathogen to seed a new infection.

 

 

Although it is suspected that some airborne transmission of coronavirus may occur, generally coronavirus is not considered a virus which normally transmits by the airborne route. As you know, coronavirus is also a common cold virus.

 

However, the most common type of cold virus is rhinovirus, and rhinovirus IS capable of airborne transmission (for a list of pathogens capable of airborne transmission, see here). Influenzavirus is also capable of airborne transmission. So this makes the regular rhinovirus cold virus different from coronavirus.

 

When a pathogen is airborne, surgical masks are not effective at stopping the virus from getting into your mouth or nose. So surgical masks will not be very effective at stopping rhinovirus or Influenzavirus. 

 

This is because surgical masks are not fully sealed: they are not tight-fitting at the edges, so when you breathe in, air gets in unfiltered via the edges of the mask. So any rhinovirus or influenzavirus floating in the air will be able to get into your mouth via the edges of the mask.

 

This is probably why the study found surgical masks did not reduce the amount of colds, as rhinovirus is the most common cold virus. 

 

 

 

 

The only masks that can fully stop airborne transmission are respirator masks, which are completely sealed at the edges. N95 and N99 specification masks (and their European equivalents FFP2 and FFP3) are examples of respirator masks. So you want respirator masks to stop airborne pathogens like rhinovirus and influenzavirus.   

 

Surgical masks however can in theory be effective against coronavirus, because for the large part, coronavirus is not airborne, and so coronavirus usually gets into your mouth or nose only if you are standing close to a person, and some of their spittle globules are ballistically ejected from their mouth, and shoots in the direction of your mouth, like a bullet. A surgical mask placed either over your mouth or theirs will block this bullet.   

 

And of course another route of coronavirus transmission is via contaminated hands: when you touch your mouth or nose with contaminated hands, the virus can get into your respiratory system and infect you. But again, a simple surgical mask or bandana stops you from touching your mouth and nose. So this is another way by which a mask use can prevent transmission.

 

 

 

It is also very important to note that most studies analyzing the effectiveness of masks only examine the case where masks are worn by the non-infected persons (eg doctors and nurses), to try to stop them from contracting pathogens from infected patients. The infected patients themselves do not wear masks. 

 

But when we are talking about the general pubic wearing masks in this pandemic, in this case BOTH the infected person AND the person trying to protect themselves from infection are wearing masks (in places where mask use is mandated). This is significant firstly because it provides a double protection, but more importantly, because we know that masks are far more effective at stopping the infected person from ejecting globules of infected saliva in the first place, than they are at stopping the non-infected person from being exposed to those globules. So most of the benefit of mask use in the coronavirus pandemic will arise from the infected persons wearing a mask.

 

So if you are looking for studies which examine the efficacy of masks in stopping non-airborne pathogen spread in a pandemic, you need to find a study in which both the infected and non-infected people are wearing masks. 

 

 

 

Edited by Hip, 19 July 2020 - 03:56 PM.

[geo12the]

 

You spent two days disagreeing with me in the Covid-19 thread because I posted articles saying that masks don’t work. 

 

There are tons of papers on Pubmed that show that they do work, in fact the preponderance of research shows they work. The scientific consensus is they work. By "work" I don't mean they are 100%. By "work" I don't mean all masks are equivalently effective. By "work" I mean they prevent enough virus particles from reaching you that it makes sense to wear them as part of other common sense measures to not get sick. 

[osris]

There are tons of papers on Pubmed that show that they do work, in fact the preponderance of research shows they work. The scientific consensus is they work. By "work" I don't mean they are 100%. By "work" I don't mean all masks are equivalently effective. By "work" I mean they prevent enough virus particles from reaching you that it makes sense to wear them as part of other common sense measures to not get sick. 

 

Surgical masks are not designed to stop viruses only bacteria. N95 masks are better.

[osris]

So most of the benefit of mask use in the coronavirus pandemic will arise from the infected persons wearing a mask.

 

 

That makes more sense than making non-infected people wear them. 

[Florin]

Surgical masks are not designed to stop viruses only bacteria. N95 masks are better.

Yeah, N95s are better, but wearing surgical/cloth masks can physically prevent droplets (which seem to be the primary method of transmission) from spreading the virus. See previous replies for more details.
 

That makes more sense than making non-infected people wear them.

 
How would anyone know if they're infected? They wouldn't, and that's why everyone needs to wear masks.

Edited by Florin, 20 July 2020 - 08:01 PM.

[gamesguru]

According to the first study I quoted even a simple tea-cloth or surgical mask can filter up to 80% of particles out.

The whole nonsense of "why should i wear one if i'm not sick" was started erroneously by the CDC.  You can literally reduce your chances of catching it in the first place, and of passing it on your parents or grandparents or neighbor, by the simple grace of wearing a mask out there.

Table 1

Median (IQR) protection factor by mask, by activity, by age category.

   

no activity

nodding

shaking

reading

walking

Tea cloth

Adults

2.5 (2.1–2.9)

2.2 (1.9–2.5)

2.2 (1.9–2.7)

3.2 (2.5–3.9)

2.4 (2.1–3.3)

 

children

2.2 (1.5–2.2)

1.9 (1.5–2.3)

1.9 (1.4–2.3)

2.2 (1.8–3.7)

2.2 (1.8–2.4)

Surgical mask

Adults

4.1 (3.1–7.2)

4.7 (3.4–7.3)

5.1 (3.2–7.6)

5.3 (4.3–8.0)

4.2 (3.1–5.7)

 

children

3.2 (2.2–4.1)

3.4 (2.7–5.2)

3.6 (2.7–4.3)

4.9 (4.0–5.3)

3.6 (2.4–4.2)

FFP2 mask

Adults

113 (26–210)

82 (45–179)

91 (23–187)

66 (29–107)

99 (19–169)

 

children

18 (6.1–165)

13 (3.8–41)

18 (4.0–54)

35 (8.6–91)

15 (5.1–176)

[gamesguru]

Study says wearing a mask (what kind?) reduces risk of catching it by 65%, wow!

 

https://www.ucdavis....isk-65-percent/

[Daniel Cooper]

Do you really want to play Russian roulette? What if some bioterrorist released different kinds of viruses each with a lethality of 10%? They'd just need a few to get to 99% or even to 100% lethality. Civilization could be destroyed even if 50% of humanity somehow managed to survive the pandemics. And then most of those survivors would be wiped out by famine and disease.

 

The only thing that has any guarantee of avoiding apocalyptic pandemics today and for the foreseeable future is elastomeric masks.

 

Masks are not a panacea for all viral pandemics.  

 

They don't stop ebola.  They don't stop zika.  They don't stop hantavirus.  They don't stop polio. They don't stop smallpox.  They mainly slow down upper respiratory viral infections.  But these are not the only types of viral infections that are of concern.

 

If a bioterrorist wanted a weapon, the genome for smallpox is published and a gene sequencer can make it for you. That virus has an average lethality of 30% and it is estimated that R0 would be in the range of 3.5 to 6.0 in a modern population.  And that genie is out of the bottle for anyone with the know how and funds to acquire a gene sequencer.  Weaponized versions of smallpox were thought to be more lethal and more communicable.  

 

You're really putting blinders on and looking at everything through the lens of coronavirus.  But upper respiratory viruses are hardly the only threat to humanity.  We would be far better served to have  a broad spectrum antiviral like DRACO or something similar at our disposal. 

 

Let's not be guilty of the what is commonly said of most militaries - "Generals always prepare to fight the last war".  Maybe the next pandemic will be like corona virus.  Maybe not.

 

If you want to lay in a stock of a couple of billion masks I suppose that's not a huge figure on the current federal budget.  But don't image that you're now prepared for whatever virus may come your way.

 

 

 

 

 

[Florin]

I don't see any reason to suppose that N100/P100 (and equivalent) respirators wouldn't be a panacea against any airborne viral pathogen including smallpox.

 

I've already replied about the other stuff you mentioned.

Edited by Florin, 22 July 2020 - 09:10 PM.

[Daniel Cooper]

I don't see any reason to suppose that N100/P100 (and equivalent) respirators wouldn't be a panacea against any airborne viral pathogen including smallpox.

 

I've already replied about the other stuff you mentioned.

 

Because not all viruses enter through the respiratory tract.

 

Smallpox generally is transferred by direct contact with either the patient or material that has been in contact with the patient.  It can be spread through the air, but mostly isn't. BTW - if someone were to weaponize this, they would make it an aerosol and pop the weapon over some major urban area at a time and place of their choosing.  Unless you're prepared to have everyone walk around all the time with a mask on, even when you don't have a pandemic going on, masks aren't going to help this one.

 

Zika is spread by infected mosquitoes.

 

Ebola is spread by contact with bodily fluids.  

 

Polio is spread via fecal material.

 

Hantavirus is spread by contact with rodent droppings and urine.  It can be air born, but generally doesn't have to be.

 

Add Chagas Disease to the list.  Spread by insects.  

 

And don't even get started on various STDs (herpes, HIV, chlamydia, the list goes on and on).  

 

You're looking at this through a very coronavirus centric lens.  What we need is the analog for what antibiotics are to bacteria, for viruses.  DRACO, or other similar approaches.  You have no idea what the next viral pandemic is going to look like, particularly if you are worried about bioterrorism, which you brought up. 

[Florin]

Pathogens that can cause a pandemic and destroy civilization must be transmitted through the air via either droplets or aerosols. Smallpox is mostly spread through the air, and that's why we need to worry about it, but can safely ignore any other kind of pathogen including the ones you mentioned.

 

Killing lots of people in a major urban area isn't an x-risk. But if you want to get fancy about it and, for instance, prevent rapid spread or mitigate the targeting of multiple areas at the same time, you could deploy surveillance systems that would test the air, sewage, or even a random selection of people for the appearance of new viruses.

 

I'm not against the development of antiviral medicines, but they have several fatal flaws which respirators don't suffer from.

• Don't exist yet.
• Might not work against all bioengineered viruses.
• Have poor logistics (even for a plain ol' smallpox vaccine).

Edited by Florin, 22 July 2020 - 11:00 PM.

[Daniel Cooper]

Smallpox is not mostly spread through the air.  It can be spread through the air, but it is mostly spread through contact.  Mainly through direct or indirect contact with weeping pustules. 

 

And as to "Pathogens that can cause a pandemic and destroy civilization must be transmitted through the air via either droplets or aerosols", the only pandemics that came close to destroying civilizations in human history were not spread by droplets or aerosols.  Modern sanitation and antibiotics have mostly made those non-issues at the moment.  

 

Viral pandemics have not to date been close to destroying civilization.  They've killed a lot of people.  The 1918 pandemic killed a lot of people. It did not come close to destroying civilization. 

 

Masks certainly appear to be useful, but let's not make this into a religion.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by Daniel Cooper, 23 July 2020 - 03:00 PM.

[gamesguru]

Nothing but a credulous appeal to conservatism.

 

Of course viral pandemics have not destroyed civilization, that's an extreme outcome.  But suppose measles (high contagious) or smallpox (highly deadly) were in place of the COVID-19 (moderately contagious, moderately deadly).. would you still uphold this "nah, forget the masks we never wore them, they're uncomfortable, it's facism to make me wear one, no thanks" entitled BS?  Or would you kneel down and appeal to that dusty, deeply human essence hidden within?

 

Prior to this pandemic I never viewed going shopping with the flu as potentially killing someone's immuno-compromised friend, but now I see it as a pretty greedy behavior.  I am right to distill day-by-day what is an improvement, and accept the idea of wearing a mask now whenever I am sick.  To insist otherwise is nothing but a conservation of corrupt values and a subtle, disrespectful act of spitting in the face of those weaker and less fortunate than you.

 

I am very much pleased to make wearing masks "a religion" til the vaccine is worked out and more is known about this virus.  I'm not just going to cling to old values in the face of what appears to be a quite moderately deadly virus.  Not going to make the extreme stipulation that "civilization collapse" before I impose the most mild inconvenience on myself of wearing a mask.

[Daniel Cooper]

I've said that wearing masks is a good thing.  I even suggested buying a few billion masks and putting them in a warehouse would be a good thing.

 

If I've made a "credulous appeal to conservatism" it escapes me at the moment.

 

All I've said is that you must not assume that the next pandemic will look like this pandemic, and that having some broad spectrum antiviral treatments on hand (which is technology that is nearly on hand but for the lethargy of the FDA and a reluctance to climb that funding hurdle) is probably a good idea. 

 

In fact, if you'll merely pause to think about it, I'm proposing something more revolutionary and it is the "masks cure all ills" position that is mired in conservatism.

 

 

[Mind]

Nothing but a credulous appeal to conservatism.

 

Of course viral pandemics have not destroyed civilization, that's an extreme outcome.  But suppose measles (high contagious) or smallpox (highly deadly) were in place of the COVID-19 (moderately contagious, moderately deadly).. would you still uphold this "nah, forget the masks we never wore them, they're uncomfortable, it's facism to make me wear one, no thanks" entitled BS?  Or would you kneel down and appeal to that dusty, deeply human essence hidden within?

 

Prior to this pandemic I never viewed going shopping with the flu as potentially killing someone's immuno-compromised friend, but now I see it as a pretty greedy behavior.  I am right to distill day-by-day what is an improvement, and accept the idea of wearing a mask now whenever I am sick.  To insist otherwise is nothing but a conservation of corrupt values and a subtle, disrespectful act of spitting in the face of those weaker and less fortunate than you.

 

I am very much pleased to make wearing masks "a religion" til the vaccine is worked out and more is known about this virus.  I'm not just going to cling to old values in the face of what appears to be a quite moderately deadly virus.  Not going to make the extreme stipulation that "civilization collapse" be re I impose the most mild inconvenience on myself of wearing a mask.

 

People eating too many carbs and sugar, not exercising, and using drugs has killed hundreds of millions of more people than this virus ever will, yet we don't require of force people to eat healthy and/or join a gym....because....wait for it....most people believe in individual liberty. We allow 40,000 people per year to die on the highways (for a century now in the U.S.) Everyday you get on the highway you are endangering the life of your fellow human, yet, driving is not banned. If I was afraid of a virus that kills a fraction of a percent of people (and much less than 1/10 of 1% of healthy people under 50), then I would stay home. If other people want to take a risk with their life (such as with driving), they are fine to do so. I won't stop them.

 

Up until now, respiratory viruses were considered a fact of life. Hundreds of thousands of people (even millions of people in some years) have died of respiratory viruses each year. Yet, it was NEVER considered greedy, or thoughtless, or criminal, to just go about daily life, until about the last two weeks (in the U.S.). For the entirety of human history, you were never considered a "murderer" for not wearing a mask. Now many people are absolutely pushing this line of thinking. How soon before "wear and mask or face prison time!!!" Or face the death penalty.

[Daniel Cooper]

That's a good point.  Overeating certainly kills more people in a year that this virus will in the US. 

 

And as you say, 40,000 people die in car accidents every year in the US.  If we were to adopt a "safety at any cost" attitude towards driving, if we didn't ban it outright, we would institute a national 25 mph speed limit and mandate the wearing of helmets and protective clothing for anyone in a car and cut that virtually to zero.

 

Lots of people go around repeating the "if it only saves one life it's worth it mantra".  But nobody believes that a human life is worth any arbitrary cost. Nobody. Otherwise we'd have that 25 mph national speed limit and alcohol would be completely forbidden.  And, why not throw in a dusk till dawn curfew while you're at it.

 

It's really interesting when you look at prior pandemics and the reaction to them in fairly modern times.  The 1968 Hong Kong flu pandemic may have killed as many as 100,000 Americans.  And that was in a country of only 200 million people (vs 330 million today).  It was reported in the media, but not dramatically.  If you talk to someone that was a young adult at that time, most won't even remember that a particularly bad flu had occurred. Estimates are that the '68 flu killed 1 million world wide, on a total world population of 3.5 billion (versus 7.6 billion today).  So far covid has killed about 625,000 globally.

 

That's not to say that covid-19 isn't a serious pandemic.  But attitudes about these things seem to have taken a very dramatic shift very recently.

 

 

[Florin]

It's a fact that smallpox is mostly spread through the air. This is common knowledge, and a quick search will prove it.
 
Your logic seems to be that if something never happened in the past, it won't happen in the future. Nuclear weapons haven't been close to destroying civilization in the past, therefore nuclear weapons won't destroy civilization in the future. 100% of mice can be killed by a modified form of mousepox, which is closely related to smallpox. It's also vaccine resistant. And it was created accidentally. Do you really want to gamble that the same kind of pathogen can't be developed for humans?
 
I've already presented several arguments about why masks are superior to any broad spectrum antiviral for the foreseeable future, and I see no reason to doubt this.

 

https://www.newscien...ioterror-fears/

[Daniel Cooper]

It's a fact that smallpox is mostly spread through the air. This is common knowledge, and a quick search will prove it.
 
Your logic seems to be that if something never happened in the past, it won't happen in the future. Nuclear weapons haven't been close to destroying civilization in the past, therefore nuclear weapons won't destroy civilization in the future. 100% of mice can be killed by a modified form of mousepox, which is closely related to smallpox. It's also vaccine resistant. And it was created accidentally. Do you really want to gamble that the same kind of pathogen can't be developed for humans?
 
I've already presented several arguments about why masks are superior to any broad spectrum antiviral for the foreseeable future, and I see no reason to doubt this.

 

https://www.newscien...ioterror-fears/

 

It's absolutely surprising that you see no reason to doubt your own arguments. Who'd have thunk it? 

 

Look if bioterrorism is your thing, masks aren't really a good answer to that issue.

 

Let's say I'm a bioterrorist and that I've got this really slick engineered killer smallpox.  I want to kill a bunch of people, so what am I going to do with it?

 

Well, I'm going to cook up hundreds or thousands of pounds of the stuff in a bioreactor vat.  Then I'm going to dry it out, apply a static charge dissipator so that it doesn't clump up then I'm going to come up with a deployment scheme.  I might think about putting it in some sort of conventional bomb to disperse it.  But that has the downside that people know that something has happened when my bomb pops and they might start to look for something like a bioweapon in the mix.

 

No, if I'm a smart terrorist I want a deployment scheme that's stealthy.  So, I build some dispersal units with timers and some sort of dispensing mechanism so that they turn on every so often and blow out some of my deadly pox.  Then I find some nice tall buildings in a dense urban environment (maybe several), for instance NYC, LA, and Chicago.  I put these on the roof and walk away.  Then every 15 minutes or so they puff out an cloud of smallpox that nobody is going to notice 24/7 for a week or two.

 

I'll do this next year when covid has passed and people aren't wearing masks.  If I do that in a few big cities, I'm going to kill hundreds of thousands of people (maybe more) in the initial first pass infections alone, and your masks aren't going to do a damn thing about it because no one is going to be wearing a mask, unless you propose some sort of law that everyone must wear a mask all the time from now on.  Yes, your mask will probably help a lot with the 2nd generation exposure. But I've already killed a huge number of people at that point.

 

So, your bioterrorism argument is actually a pretty compelling case for some sort of broad spectrum antiviral.  

Edited by Daniel Cooper, 23 July 2020 - 07:47 PM.

[Florin]

A drunk driver kills another driver and is charged with manslaughter. An infected asymptomatic guy refuses to wear a cloth mask and goes on to infect another person (who was wearing a cloth mask) and that person dies of COVID-19. What's the difference?

[Daniel Cooper]

A drunk driver kills another driver and is charged with manslaughter. An infected asymptomatic guy refuses to wear a cloth mask and goes on to infect another person (who was wearing a cloth mask) and that person dies of COVID-19. What's the difference?

 

Well, your scenario applies equally well with the normal influenza virus. Is a person walking around with asymptomatic influenza without a mask that infects someone who subsequently dies also guilty of manslaughter?  This of course has happened every year since time immemorial.

Edited by Daniel Cooper, 23 July 2020 - 07:58 PM.

[Daniel Cooper]

The argument for mandating masks is that poorly effective masks (homemade mask, medical procedure mask) do far more to prevent the outward transmission of the virus than they do in protecting you from inhaling the virus.

 

But you of course are not limited to using poorly effective masks. If you are concerned about contracting covid, you can buy a very effective N99 mask and virtually eliminate your risk of inhaling the virus.  You can wear that mask whenever you're out in public.  

 

We've somehow gotten into this weird mode of putting the onerous of your health on other people when in fact you can effectively protect yourself if that is of a concern to you.  I suppose the former has some appeal if you are of a collectivist bent.  

 

 

 

[Mind]

A drunk driver kills another driver and is charged with manslaughter. An infected asymptomatic guy refuses to wear a cloth mask and goes on to infect another person (who was wearing a cloth mask) and that person dies of COVID-19. What's the difference?

 

Are you serious? The very definition of "asymptomatic" means that you would not know if you are carrying the virus. Respiratory viruses and other communicable diseases kill millions of people around the world every year. Why....just in the last week or two....is there this push to criminalize normal human behaviors.

 

Hugging, hand-shaking, kissing, and any kind-of close human interaction spreads this virus, just like every other virus that has ever been known in human history. Are all of these behaviors now criminal behavior - worthy of manslaughter charges? It is well-studied that lack of social interaction has severe negative effects on human health. How can you justify keeping parents from hugging their kids, grandparents not playing with their grandkids, lovers not holding hands, etc...

 

Viruses are a constant part of human life, we all have them all the time, we breathe in innumerable virus particles (and bacteria, and mold spores, etc) with every breath. A virus that doesn't have an effect on me, might have a negative effect on someone else. This is the case every flu/cold season of every year. Are you going to start advocating 100% mask usage all the time, everywhere, every flu season - else manslaughter charges?

 

Are you advocating masks and isolation forever - else criminal charges? Once you force everyone to live in isolation, then it will have to stay that way, because if you live in isolation and don't interact with anyone, EVERY virus is now a novel virus, and is more likely to make you ill and kill you. The world used to be that way. Isolated populations did not have immunity and when they encountered people from other areas of the world, it was devastating. Is that what you want to return to?

 

People interacting all over the world keeps our individual and collective immune systems in good shape and better able to handle various new mutant strains of common viruses.

[Daniel Cooper]

It's amazing how issues like this devolve into religious issues pretty quickly.  

 

No getting around it.  Man is a religious animal. He will have his religion even if he's an atheist.

 

 

[gamesguru]

Why....just in the last week or two....is there this push to criminalize normal human behaviors.

 

Yes, while no one thinks it unjust to wish highway automobile deaths were not a thing, at the same time we can at least agree doing away with it at the present technological competency is impracticable.

Why is every advance in reason—each stint of progress etched forward by society—met by hostility and incredulity from the conservatives?  If safer cars were available tomorrow, would you protest the freedom against autonomous drivers, or against seat belts even?

 

Were we wrong to invent penicillin?  Perhaps our immunity would have been better off without it?  All that pain inflicted by needles reeks of injustice. 

 

The respiratory virus in question is not fair to compare to the common flu, as it has an orders of magnitude higher preponderance for killing the marginally ill-at-health.  Therefore—given the unprecedented battle at hand—a more mediated and compassionate approach is called for.  It is true the numbers pale in comparison to the black death of the 13th century, but it is important to keep in mind the ever decreasing per capita deaths attributable to war and disease in modern times.  Practically no one even died in WWII even compared to the Three Kingdoms War.

Edited by gamesguru, 23 July 2020 - 10:48 PM.

[Florin]

It's absolutely surprising that you see no reason to doubt your own arguments. Who'd have thunk it? 

 

It shouldn't be surprising, because you've presented no compelling counter arguments. That's actually what I was about to write, but I changed my mind and decided to be more succinct. 
 

Look if bioterrorism is your thing, masks aren't really a good answer to that issue.

 

Let's say I'm a bioterrorist and that I've got this really slick engineered killer smallpox.  I want to kill a bunch of people, so what am I going to do with it?

 

Well, I'm going to cook up hundreds or thousands of pounds of the stuff in a bioreactor vat.  Then I'm going to dry it out, apply a static charge dissipator so that it doesn't clump up then I'm going to come up with a deployment scheme.  I might think about putting it in some sort of conventional bomb to disperse it.  But that has the downside that people know that something has happened when my bomb pops and they might start to look for something like a bioweapon in the mix.

 

No, if I'm a smart terrorist I want a deployment scheme that's stealthy.  So, I build some dispersal units with timers and some sort of dispensing mechanism so that they turn on every so often and blow out some of my deadly pox.  Then I find some nice tall buildings in a dense urban environment (maybe several), for instance NYC, LA, and Chicago.  I put these on the roof and walk away.  Then every 15 minutes or so they puff out an cloud of smallpox that nobody is going to notice 24/7 for a week or two.
 
I'll do this next year when covid has passed and people aren't wearing masks.  If I do that in a few big cities, I'm going to kill hundreds of thousands of people (maybe more) in the initial first pass infections alone, and your masks aren't going to do a damn thing about it because no one is going to be wearing a mask, unless you propose some sort of law that everyone must wear a mask all the time from now on.  Yes, your mask will probably help a lot with the 2nd generation exposure. But I've already killed a huge number of people at that point.
 
So, your bioterrorism argument is actually a pretty compelling case for some sort of broad spectrum antiviral.

 

Well, you don't want to kill just a bunch of people; you want to kill everyone. Here are some similar (and better) scenarios that show the advantages of respirators over a broad spectrum antiviral.

 

Tomorrow

 

If bioterrorists start releasing pox, it's game over. Lockdowns won't be sustainable and there won't be enough respirators.

 

Next year

 

If bioterrorists start releasing pox when everyone has respirators, some people will die, but game over will be avoided. Respirators will have to be worn until treatments become available or the bioterrorists are arrested. A broad spectrum antiviral is still not available.

 

+5 years

 

If bioterrorists start releasing pox with a very long incubation period, asymptomatic spread, and broad spectrum antiviral resistance, it's game over. Countermeasures such as respirators or a broad spectrum antiviral would be useless. The only way to avoid this scenario is to deploy pathogen surveillance systems and combine them with respirators or a universal antiviral (something that can defeat any virus). But universal antivirals are sci-fi and may remain sci-fi forever, so the only thing you're left with is respirators. So, again, respirators will have to be worn until treatments become available or the bioterrorists are arrested.

 

Sooner or later, you'll just have to join the Cult of the Mask (and the Pathogen Surveillance System). But if you can convert me to the Cult of the Broad Spectrum Antiviral, that's okay too.

 

Edited by Florin, 23 July 2020 - 10:58 PM.

[Florin]

Well, your scenario applies equally well with the normal influenza virus. Is a person walking around with asymptomatic influenza without a mask that infects someone who subsequently dies also guilty of manslaughter?  This of course has happened every year since time immemorial.

 

Usually, tanks are available during the flu season.

 

The argument for mandating masks is that poorly effective masks (homemade mask, medical procedure mask) do far more to prevent the outward transmission of the virus than they do in protecting you from inhaling the virus.

 

But you of course are not limited to using poorly effective masks. If you are concerned about contracting covid, you can buy a very effective N99 mask and virtually eliminate your risk of inhaling the virus.  You can wear that mask whenever you're out in public.  

 

We've somehow gotten into this weird mode of putting the onerous of your health on other people when in fact you can effectively protect yourself if that is of a concern to you.  I suppose the former has some appeal if you are of a collectivist bent.  

 

But tanks are in short supply right now. That's the key difference.

[Florin]

Are you serious? The very definition of "asymptomatic" means that you would not know if you are carrying the virus. Respiratory viruses and other communicable diseases kill millions of people around the world every year. Why....just in the last week or two....is there this push to criminalize normal human behaviors.

Everyone should know by now that they'll probably be asymptomatic eventually if mask wearing is neglected.
 

Are you advocating masks and isolation forever - else criminal charges? Once you force everyone to live in isolation, then it will have to stay that way, because if you live in isolation and don't interact with anyone, EVERY virus is now a novel virus, and is more likely to make you ill and kill you. The world used to be that way. Isolated populations did not have immunity and when they encountered people from other areas of the world, it was devastating. Is that what you want to return to?

 

Masks, not isolation. And if everyone wore respirators instead of cloth masks, the pandemic would burn itself out a lot quicker. But everyone seems to want to learn this lesson the hard way. Well, okay; one way or another, the lesson must be learned in order to avoid a game over pandemic.

[Hip]

Up until now, respiratory viruses were considered a fact of life. Hundreds of thousands of people (even millions of people in some years) have died of respiratory viruses each year. Yet, it was NEVER considered greedy, or thoughtless, or criminal, to just go about daily life, until about the last two weeks (in the U.S.). For the entirety of human history, you were never considered a "murderer" for not wearing a mask. Now many people are absolutely pushing this line of thinking. How soon before "wear and mask or face prison time!!!" Or face the death penalty.

 

I understand your point of view that up to now, we've not really worried about the respiratory viruses and other pathogens that human beings pass from one to another, even though these may cause chronic disease or kill in many different ways.

 

But the same argument used to be applied to drink-driving. When the new drink-driving laws were brought in, my father's generation would resit them, and would say: "but we always used to drink and drive, it was quite normal to drive home from a night out drinking with friends being totally drunk".

 

But the law is a rational force in the world, and once it was shown that statistically being drunk in charge of a car was a high risk for accidents and fatalities, the law was changed such that you could be arrested if driving drunk, and if you kill someone in a careless driving road accident while drunk, then there are much longer prison sentences. 

 

So if the law is to remain a rational force, it must apply to pernicious infectious pathogens. Once we have shown beyond all doubt that these pathogens are harmful, then the law should treat them just like any other factor in the world that can harm or kill others. 

 

If you have had warts at the end of your penis (which means your dick may still harbor the human papillomavirus), and you do not inform your new girlfriend of this before she gives you unprotected oral sex, and she later then dies of oral cancer caused by the human papillomavirus from your warts, you should be prosecuted for manslaughter, I would say.

 

There are already laws which cover such situations: Intentional or Reckless Sexual Transmission of Infection.

Edited by Hip, 24 July 2020 - 04:01 AM.

[Daniel Cooper]

We'll just have to disagree I suppose.  I see a lot of government compulsion down that path you guys are proposing.

 

What's the limiting principle in your argument?  If not wearing a mask is grounds for prosecution during a covid pandemic, is it grounds for prosecution during a flu season? Yes, there are different levels of risk.  Are they dramatically different? Someone suggested an order of magnitude (i.e. a factor of 10).  Probably if you pick a mild flu season.  During a bad flu season, I think we're talking about more like a factor of 3x to 5x.  What's your bright demarcation line?  Is 4x the cutoff?  If so, why? 

 

These are hard questions.  I sure however that some will denigrate even asking these questions as "idiotic conservatism" or something similar.  That is the result of believing that your opinions aren't mere opinions, they are facts.  And anyone that questions these facts can only be malicious (i.e. evil) or foolish.  There can be no such thing as a good faith questioning of your opinions under these assumptions. But that seems to be the condition the country finds itself in these days.