I’ve been telling you for a LONG time that masks don’t work in preventing the transmission of a virus. Lately, the mainstream world is kinda-sorta catching on. A new study published in (wait for it) The Lancet has added to the chorus of “unmasks our kids”!
Click here for more details. In the meantime, an excerpt:
“There has been considerable debate around mask requirements in schools in the United States and other countries during the Covid-19 pandemic,” the authors state in the abstract. “To date, there have been no randomized controlled trials of mask requirements in children. All analyses of the effectiveness of school mask mandates have relied on observational studies. The Centers for Disease Control in the U.S. have released multiple observational studies suggesting that school mask mandates significantly reduce case rates. However, there have also been numerous additional US and international observational studies finding no significant effect of school mask mandates on pediatric cases.”
Reminder #4,411: It was never about a virus.
Mask mandates, especially for kids, tap into the angry, vindictive sanctimony of the bien pensant. They already see their kids as extensions of their social persona, so any crackpot virtue-signalling scheme gets their approval. It's lagniappe for them when, e.g. with masks and other petty cruelties, they get to afflict other people's kids. They wallow in it. You can argue the facts with them, but to no avail. This is their moment for melodrama and anal sadistic spasms. They're loving it.
I do understand immunocompromised teachers and staff being more comfortable with kids in masks. But N95 quality mask should provide them with good protection without the students masking up.
However---if a good chunk of the CARES money had been dedicated to replacement/retrofits of all public buildings, especially schools, with improved air filtration/ventilation we would greatly reduce disease transmission. Not just covid, but regular colds, flus, strep and all the bugs kids pass around in classrooms. Adults sometimes joke kids are little Petri dishes; actually it’s their classrooms.
Unfortunately when the Feds pass out money, their are so many donors and grifters taking a cut as the funds are disbursed, there is not much left once it gets to the level of paying a local HVAC company for their labor and equipment needed.
As a result, one of the more useful things we could have done with that money did not get done.