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The case against masks at school

theatlantic.com

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Re: The case against masks at school

#631

Post by ianferrel »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #599
perardi wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and? The hospital case load is overwhelmingly, screamingly, massively dominated by the elderly unvaccinated. https://www.doh.wa.gov/Portals/1/Documents/1600/coronavirus/... Given the extremely contagious nature of Omicron, what plausible way do we have to prevent these individuals from getting COVID and using hospital space? And don't say masking up kids—because if they haven't gotten vaccinated, then why do you…

The hospital case load is overwhelmingly, screamingly, massively dominated by the elderly unvaccinated. Are you sure this is true? The data you linked to shows that hospitalization rate for 65+ unvaccinated is 7x 65+ vaccinated. But WA has a great vaccination rate, over 99% for 65+ with one or more shot. So even with 7x the rate, unvaccinated elderly probably aren't massively dominating hospitalizations because it is…

The data that is showing 99+% with one or more shots is bad. Lots of second and third doses could not be linked to the original dose and got counted as "first" doses, then the percentage of people with first doses got capped at 99.9% (or something very high) because it would be obviously absurd if 115% of people had one or more doses.

Vaccination rates in liberal states for the elderly are pretty good. But not 99%.

Re: The case against masks at school

#632

Post by mbeattie »

gkbrk wrote: post #541
tqi wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. If your Grandpa chose to not get vaccinated and gets COVID, thats his problem. 2. The idea that anyone who wants in person learning is a "screaming Karen" is fucking stupid. There is lots of evidence that remote learning has all kinds of negative outcomes for kids, and your (frankly sexist) dismissiveness is the reason this conversation never goes anywhere.

> If your Grandpa chose to not get vaccinated and gets COVID, thats his problem. Sure thing. Can we get the Grandpa's to sign documents saying they're going unvaccinated by choice and would like to opt-out from any hospital care related to COVID if their resources are needed for any other patient?

Sure and while we’re at it, let’s not treat aids patients because they engaged in high risk activity and not treat heart attacks of the overweight either.

Re: The case against masks at school

#633

Post by AnthonBerg »

jimmyjazz14 wrote: post #453
michaelmrose wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thesis of the article is that even though studies show masks work studies in schools had obvious flaws and are measuring multiple confounding factors ergo masks might not work so we have no justification for mask mandates. This is materially different from knowing they don't work. I cannot countenance the idea that keeping most of your spit with you rather than floating around the room doesn't reduce spread of a…

Yeah I don't think they are really saying that they absolutely don't work but that the evidence that they do is weak enough to justify removing the mandates. They address N95 mask in the article (did you read it) pointing out that they are more difficult to breath in and hinder communication more (I'll add my own point in that they are harder to keep a seal with which seems to be quite important according to the stud…

N95 masks are not at all difficult to breathe in in my experience. Not at all.

Re: The case against masks at school

#634

Post by fknorangesite »

endisneigh wrote: post #516
watersb wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually want to hear good reasons for avoiding vaccinations, because many people care a lot about that. I can understand immuno-compromised people, an underlying medical condition, for whom a vaccine may not work or may be dangerous. Undergoing chemotherapy treatment for cancer? Got it: vaccines won't help you (or anyone else) until you can get past the cancer. I don't agree with an argument from stand-my-ground,…

Nobody here is advocating for avoiding vaccinations so your entire point is moot.

> Nobody here is advocating for avoiding vaccinations so your entire point is moot.

I consistently see anti-vaccination rhetoric on HN.

Re: The case against masks at school

#635

Post by rexf »

phailhaus wrote: post #307
ngngngng wrote: post #275

Funny to watch the Atlantic change directions on COVID over the last few months. I go back and forth on masks. In general I find them to be a minor inconvenience, although I believe they're more inconvenient for me than most because I'm blind and no matter what I do they always fog up my glasses. But while masks themselves are mildly inconvenient, harsh mask mandates and restrictions become much more of an annoyance…

> Try taking a 6 hour flight with a 2 year old that's required to keep his mask on the entire flight, and when he takes it off (because he's 2, of course he's going to take it off) the flight attendants threaten to turn the plane around and ban you permanently. Never heard about this, source? Toddlers tend to be somewhat exempt from mask mandates because they're toddlers and everyone understands when they don't compl…

Yeah. I have to assume user ngngngng is exaggerating to make a statement.

I've flown in the past year and was annoyed that adult passengers in front of me weren't wearing their mask (or wearing it with their nose exposed). While the flight attendant told them a few times times to put their mask on correctly, the flight attendants were not going to "turn the plane around and ban [them] permanently".

Re: The case against masks at school

#636

Post by AnthonBerg »

michaelmrose wrote: post #452
vanviegen wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Extremely minimal? Masks make it a lot harder to communicate effectively. People are harder to understand, emotions are harder to read, speaking takes more effort. If communicating is the main thing you do all day, because you're a teacher for instance, that is a significant inconvenience.

Personally I found that a good n95 mask aside from being more effective is far less muffling than a shitty cloth mask.

Much, much more comfortable too.

Re: The case against masks at school

#637

Post by twblalock »

clutchdude wrote: post #468
taylodl wrote: post #304

General observation from reading the comments - the folks on HN must not have many friends working in medicine for if they had they'd realize those friends are swamped and burned-out. They'd also know that pretty much the only condition we're treating nowadays is Covid. Surgeries are continuing to be postponed - including surgeries that can lead to worse problems down the road such as removing cancerous tumors. And i…

As with many things, nuance is a subject that many on HN fail to grasp. They believe that masking is a binary decision and that once made, the die is cast. Rather, if we tied masking mandates to thresholds of community spread and encouraged/provided high quality masks, the public would at least show medical professionals we're interested in keeping another body out of the morgue, aside from the obvious vaccination ne…

> Rather, if we tied masking mandates to thresholds of community spread and encouraged/provided high quality masks, the public would at least show medical professionals we're interested in keeping another body out of the morgue, aside from the obvious vaccination need.

At this point, mandates have convinced everyone who will ever be convinced. There is no more convincing in our future. A subset of people will always reject masks and vaccines.

Re: The case against masks at school

#638

Post by taylodl »

pcmoney wrote: post #609
watersb wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually want to hear good reasons for avoiding vaccinations, because many people care a lot about that. I can understand immuno-compromised people, an underlying medical condition, for whom a vaccine may not work or may be dangerous. Undergoing chemotherapy treatment for cancer? Got it: vaccines won't help you (or anyone else) until you can get past the cancer. I don't agree with an argument from stand-my-ground,…

How Does an individual choice to get vaccinated or not impact others? Vaccines do not stop transmission of Covid nor do they stop you from getting Covid. They merely decrease your chances of getting severe Covid or dying from Covid. Thus the decision to vax or not is clearly a personal choice.

Because if you're unvaccinated you're much more likely to require hospitalization should you get Covid. The impact to others is the unvaccinated are consuming medical resources and causing burn-out amongst medical practitioners.

Re: The case against masks at school

#639

Post by namarie »

stvswn wrote: post #548
taylodl wrote: post #304

General observation from reading the comments - the folks on HN must not have many friends working in medicine for if they had they'd realize those friends are swamped and burned-out. They'd also know that pretty much the only condition we're treating nowadays is Covid. Surgeries are continuing to be postponed - including surgeries that can lead to worse problems down the road such as removing cancerous tumors. And i…

I find it kind of amazing that the justification for school mask mandates (which was once "keep kids from getting covid") has morphed into "we'll lower the load on hospitals if the kids keep their faces covered." Can anyone imagine if we went back to 2020 and pitched this to parents? "Look, if your kid gets it, it will be similar in nature to a chest cold. It's somewhat more dangerous for the elderly. In order to kee…

> In order to keep doctors and nurses from getting burned out

You say it as if that's the only consequence of a medical shortage... How about replacing that with "in order to have enough functioning doctors and nurses able to treat patients with cancer, respond to car accidents, and do organ transplants"?

Re: The case against masks at school

#640

Post by 323 »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #467
adamrezich wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the retraction is appreciated but, if you'll excuse me for saying so, the fact that you thought this at all shows that we're well into "brainwashing" territory with this mask nonsense. it should be beyond obvious to any neutral observer that putting a covering over one's nose and mouth will affect their breathing airflow, especially so when exercising. you don't even have to try it yourself to intuit this, it's just…

> the fact that you thought this at all shows that we're well into "brainwashing" territory with this mask nonsense. I don't agree with that. As noted, blood oxygen levels for most people are not changed by mask wearing (presumably, most of us just add the extra 20-30% effort to keep the airflow up and/or were nowhere near close to requiring the full breath). > once you have tried it, there should be zero doubt in yo…

> I do not feel that my airflow is impacted at all

This just means that you are very fit. Just like athletes sometimes train on purpose with air restricting masks.

It's like saying "I can lift 200 pounds easily, so people complaining that they are struggling with that amount are mistaken".

The FFP3 euro standard (N99 equiv) mask I'm wearing is very noticeable to me and tiring if I walk fast for example.

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