Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

directorsblog.nih.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 83 posts

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#31

Post by ezekg »

goldcd wrote: post #28
fbonetti wrote: post #11

[deleted]

I'm unsure why you wouldn't consider wearing a mask to "be the right thing" I don't think anybody is saying that masks are a panacea - that would be "everybody stay home until we have a working vaccine". However, they seem a completely sensible thing that you can do that reduces transmission (so some extent at least), whilst allowing you to go about your normal life relatively unimpeded. A bit like speed limits on th…

There are other ways. I encourage you to research The Great Barrington Declaration.

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#32

Post by mindslight »

norwegianwhale wrote: post #19

It's actually very annoying to wear a mask. Also, I don't want to be thinking 24/7 about the virus, and the mask reminds me of it. I can't count how many hours I have personally wasted thinking about the virus this year. That surely must go into the bottom line of prevention measures.

There are striking differences in infection rates between countries. If you think masks are not effective, then go find out what is effective and argue for the merits of that instead of just lazily spreading FUD about currently accepted best practices.

(At some point we need to start viewing these types of comments as likely coming from Anti-American disinformation farms.)

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#33

Post by theplague42 »

ssully wrote: post #20
ezekg wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are downsides, like when the government threatens violence against its citizens for not complying with a preventative measure with mixed efficacy at best.

What government has threatened violence in regards to mask mandates?

I guess anything that is fined or outlaws is eventually "enforced by violence" but it's still a silly argument. If a store asks you to leave, and you don't, and the store calls the police to arrest you, you aren't being arrested for not wearing a mask. You're being arrested for not leaving when asked.

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#34

Post by norwegianwhale »

jonsno56 wrote: post #29
norwegianwhale wrote: post #19

It's actually very annoying to wear a mask. Also, I don't want to be thinking 24/7 about the virus, and the mask reminds me of it. I can't count how many hours I have personally wasted thinking about the virus this year. That surely must go into the bottom line of prevention measures.

Bro why are you even on a startup forum if basic things are so hard for you

Please, don't make personal attacks in HN. This is explicitly stated in the code of conduct, and it's generally expected in the software community.

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#35

Post by HarryHirsch »

ezekg wrote: post #31
goldcd wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm unsure why you wouldn't consider wearing a mask to "be the right thing" I don't think anybody is saying that masks are a panacea - that would be "everybody stay home until we have a working vaccine". However, they seem a completely sensible thing that you can do that reduces transmission (so some extent at least), whilst allowing you to go about your normal life relatively unimpeded. A bit like speed limits on th…

There are other ways. I encourage you to research The Great Barrington Declaration.

Why someone would trust a libertarian think tank when it comes to epidemiology is beyond me. You'd like to know: what do the Koch brothers do? We know that they say, but do they take their own medicine?

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#36

Post by goalieca »

nmridul wrote: post #26
polote wrote: post #12

I can't buy it, European citizens almost all have to wear masks and we can clearly see that this measure alone doesn't seem to have an impact on the epidemic as the speed of the increase of cases is more or less the same that what we had in march. And nobody was wearing masks at that time.

That shows the masks are working. Since the number of infected people have increased, the rate of infection should also increase. If it remains same, then there is an actual reduction

The epidemiological curve is actually linear (constant derivative) in the middle. It's basically an S-curve in our parlance.

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#37

Post by dheera »

nradov wrote: post #27
dheera wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time I leave the bay area to go somewhere hiking, the towns I pass through are full of both (a) Trump flags and (b) people not wearing masks. Two weeks ago, employees at local bakeries near Mt. Shasta weren't wearing masks in the kitchen. Even the employees at Taco Bell Drive Thru near Mt. Shasta weren't wearing masks (they had their masks off their nose). Complained via Taco Bell website and got no response. T…

For most people, regular consumption of Taco Bell is probably a worse health risk than COVID-19. Obesity and hypertension are known killers on their own, and also increase the risk of a bad COVID-19 outcome.

Although I agree with you about the health risk of regular consumption of fast food, I'm not a regular consumer of Taco Bell, and occasional consumption of fast food is not a significant health risk to most people. I only hoped that when I passed through the area that a nationwide chain would have slightly better COVID sanitation standards than the local establishments I passed by at first. It turned out not to be the case.

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#38

Post by wbronitsky »

norwegianwhale wrote: post #34
jonsno56 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bro why are you even on a startup forum if basic things are so hard for you

Please, don't make personal attacks in HN. This is explicitly stated in the code of conduct, and it's generally expected in the software community.

This is rich. This throwaway account is going around posting short dismissals that don't add to the discussion, which is against site guidelines because it causes problems with reasonable discussions, and then uses these guidelines to try and protect themselves after injecting flamebait, which also happens against the site guidelines for the exact same reasons.

It would be impossible for the poster to not be aware of what they are doing.

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#39

Post by nfRfqX5n »

polote wrote: post #12

I can't buy it, European citizens almost all have to wear masks and we can clearly see that this measure alone doesn't seem to have an impact on the epidemic as the speed of the increase of cases is more or less the same that what we had in march. And nobody was wearing masks at that time.

either you are commenting on the not-so-great title of this article, or you didn't read it.

the last paragraph clearly states:

> To do so, each of us needs to follow these three W’s: Wear a mask. Watch your distance (stay 6 feet apart). Wash your hands often.

Re: Masks could save 130k American lives from COVID19 by March

#40

Post by nimbius »

I had faith in my fellow americans to wear a mask, but after filling in a week for our front desk salesperson I'm increasingly confounded by the lack of simple human compassion a lot of people seem to exhibit. customers who dont wear masks and are told to leave almost always have a long-winded presidential speach ready for anyone in earshot...rambling discourse about freedom, communism, china, asthma, you name it...anything they can think of so as to avoid accountability for their poor decision.
Post reply on HN