Throwback Thursday: The 6-feet-apart lie
The Gospel According to Fauci preached the six-feet-apart social distancing mantra for a couple of years. But (surprise, surprise) it never stood up to even the most cursory scrutiny.
Did you know that the now-carved-in-stone concept is based on a random theory proposed by a German hygienist named Carl Flügge in 1897?
Flügge proposed 3 to 6 feet as the distance pathogen-containing droplets could travel. But he lacked anything close to the knowledge or equipment needed to make such a determination.
In fact, the six-foot decree has been consistently challenged by “experts” of all stripes for 75 years. As early as 1948, for example, a study found that only a small minority of droplets traveled as far as Flügge suggested.
Still, anyone wanting to look smart/compassionate/sane/woke intoned the words “six feet apart” over and over as if it were based on some reliable data.
May the narrative and the people behind it continue to crumble…
Also, it was known very early on that the Dreaded Plague spread like other respiratory viruses, through aerosols that can float around for hours or even days. So the 6 foot rule, plastic barriers, one-way arrows, and masks made absolutely no sense.
Interestingly, when this 6-foot thing was first proposed in British Columbia, Dr. Bonny Henry actually SAID that there was no science behind it.
That's probably one of the few hard truths she's uttered