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The case against masks at school

theatlantic.com

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Re: The case against masks at school

#721

Post by rcurry »

dsl wrote: post #434
perardi wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or…grandpa can get vaccinated. I'd be more than happy to test and vaccinate in schools. In particular vaccinate. But having kids wear masks…which they don't do well, because they're kids…not like adults do it well either…is a fig leaf. It's not going to work. And you can see that from the massive infection rates in schools that have masks .

Of course all of our problems go away when you convince the remaining 40% of the population to get vaccinated. I'm actually in favor of doing away with masks and social distancing. Just create a nationwide policy that the unvaccinated will not be admitted or treated for COVID and we can all return to our daily lives.

If only modern medicine was reserved for the Master Race, it would be so much simpler, and cost effective!

But before you seek medical treatment we’ll just need you to fill out this questionnaire:

1. Have you ever had an alcoholic beverage?

2. Do you have a BMI greater than 18.5?

3. Have you ever eaten at The Cheesecake Factory?

4. Do you ride, run, or swim less than 40 miles per day?

Please understand that your answers may disqualify you from eligibility for healthcare. Thank you, Acme Excellence Health Partners.

Re: The case against masks at school

#722

Post by baskethead »

dsl wrote: post #688
brimble wrote: post #653

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If screaming Karens are going to insist on in person learning In defense of the Karens (ew, I feel gross even typing that) remote learning absolutely was the disaster they say it was. It was really, really bad. It's hard to exaggerate how bad it was. And I mean specifically for the kids, not for the parents (it also sucked for them/us, obviously). We can probably recover well-enough from a semester or two of it, bu…

No. It wasn't that bad. School still continued. Your children are at most slightly inconvenienced during a global pandemic that has killed MILLIONS of people. All you have to do is keep your kid looking at a screen. They may need to repeat a year of school. At some point in their future your kids boss may say "oh right, you were a pandemic kid, here let me show you." It's like someone in WW2 UK complaining that the G…

If you think it wasn't that bad, you must be from a privileged household, and haven't paid attention to the data. Children, especially low-income children, have been devastated by remote learning.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-08-13/online-l...

Re: The case against masks at school

#723

Post by jimmyjazz14 »

TameAntelope wrote: post #356
nradov wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's easy to act morally superior and make cheap emotional arguments for when you're not the one who has to make hard decisions. All lives have value, but no life has infinite value. You can't seriously expect the majority to endure perpetual mandates and restrictions just to provide some limited, temporary protection to a small minority who are vulnerable due to risk factors like obesity. https://reason.com/2022/01/…

I absolutely can expect the majority to endure a minor inconvenience, if that minority they're protecting is a thousand innocent children in a given year (you didn't pick a number, so I will, 78 million children). And the point is to lower the curve, not avoid exposure. But, again, you know all of this, you just don't care. Shameful.

Children actually have around a ten times higher chance of drowning than dying of COVID, so should we close all the pools and lakes? No we don't do that because we realize as humans that life is not without risk, in fact risk is what makes life worth living. I have children and worry every day something bad might happen to them but I let them take risk and live life because I know that's the only way that they will grow and be happy.

Re: The case against masks at school

#724

Post by skillpass »

sleepybrett wrote: post #499
pcmoney wrote: post #469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In an open air room, the difference between walking past and sitting in the same room as is negligible. Total theatre, does nothing besides allowing restaurants and patrons to feel ok/that they are “doing something” and stay open.

Which is why indoor dining rooms should still be closed. Pretending we aren't living through a pandemic that is respiratory in nature is fucking madness. Maybe if we had locked down harder for longer and treated this thing seriously in the beginning we wouldn't be almost two years into this with no end in sight.

Covid spread throughout the entire world very quickly. "Locking down harder" in any region simply delays the inevitable spike in cases once those lockdowns end.

Re: The case against masks at school

#725

Post by akg_67 »

another_story wrote: post #508

In Taiwan we've been wearing masks for over 2 years with near zero complaint at school. I have to remind a few kids a day to put it over their nose. We've had Omicron here for awhile, but it's still only a trickle of cases, with no exponential explosion. The policies here, with contact tracing, quarantine and masks, have kept things open and people from dying. I don't understand the hesitancy.

Same here in Japan. When I leave home, I put on mask and keep it on until I return home. Only time I take off mask is to eat and drink. Most people do the same.

KISS, We have kept it simple. There is no discussion about when to wear or not wear, who need to wear or not, what type of mask to wear or not.

Re: The case against masks at school

#726

Post by Zanneth »

ericd wrote: post #580
sleepybrett wrote: post #499

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why indoor dining rooms should still be closed. Pretending we aren't living through a pandemic that is respiratory in nature is fucking madness. Maybe if we had locked down harder for longer and treated this thing seriously in the beginning we wouldn't be almost two years into this with no end in sight.

People over here in France are generally living pretty normally. Far from madness, it's pretty nice. Sure, everyone masks up and whips out their phone for constant QR scanning, but restaurants are still pretty full, trams busses and trains as well, and people are getting together. Schools are in person. It probably helps that home tests are cheap ($25 for 5) and super easy to get. It's frankly pretty weird that these…

Wearing masks and having to endure "constant QR scanning" doesn't sound like normal life to me.

Re: The case against masks at school

#727

Post by JPKab »

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…

General observation from reading YOUR comment - you must not have young kids at a key developmental age in primary school for if you did you'd realize how detrimental arbitrary, poorly-fitting, non-medical masks are to small children's ability to learn to speak, read other's emotions, and other crucial milestones.

It's an uncontrolled experiment that was launched, without any regard for potential negative consequences. Your kids are older, you don't know anything about what they are facing.

My wife is a kindergarten teacher. It's a huge topic of constant discussion amongst the entire faculty at her school and others about how insanely developmentally delayed and poorly socialized the current crop of kindergartners are. They've been stuck in isolation, left alone on ipads and other screens since they were 3. This isn't just anecdotal, there are studies showing small children are TWO STANDARD DEVIATIONS behind where they should be. Your sitting here whining about young adults in an extremely high-paying profession being worn out saving a population that will mostly be dead of old age in less than 20 years, and ignoring the damage that has already been done (needlessly) and the continuing damage being done for bio-security theater. Utterly infuriating. These kids are OUR future.

Your comment showed zero empathy or thought towards that. YOUR kids didn't miss kindergarten. YOUR kids didn't get isolated. YOUR kids had a normal childhood. Mine aren't. Many others aren't. But really glad you care so much about "Global Climate Change" (why capitalize it, is it your religion?). The selfishness of your statement is appalling.

Re: The case against masks at school

#728

Post by shadowofneptune »

skillpass wrote: post #718
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 understand you are making the argument that removing mandates for masks at schools will lead us to have a shortage of medical practitioners? That seems dubious to me. From what I know, the limits on number of doctors licensed each year are tightly controlled. If students drop out, there are countless others who will be willing to take their place.

It's not just students being affected, but educators and those who supervise residents. There will be less and less spots available in residency programs, nursing programs, etc. due to this. That was already a problem pre-pandemic:

https://www.wolterskluwer.com/en/expert-insights/nursing-fac...

Compensation helps, but having to do much more work with less people increases burnout regardless of how much you're being paid.

Re: The case against masks at school

#729

Post by [deleted] »

dsl wrote: post #406
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…

I know multiple households where the initial infection vector was the kids. Grandpa might be stupid and refuse the vaccine, but keeping little Billy from becoming a carrier lessens the hospital load. If screaming Karens are going to insist on in person learning, we need to mask test and vaccinate in the schools.

[deleted]

Re: The case against masks at school

#730

Post by WillPostForFood »

ianferrel wrote: post #631
WillPostForFood wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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%.

I dug out a more accurate number, 93.6%, from the Washington dashboard. Even at 93.6%, the remaining 6.4% unvaccinated can't overwhelmingly account for hospitalizations even if they are being hospitalized at 7x the rate.

https://www.doh.wa.gov/Emergencies/COVID19/DataDashboard

edit: According to the dashboard, 59.5% of people in the hospital with covid like illness are 60+. That's vaccinated and and unvaccinated combined. We can definitively say that the hospital case load is not overwhelmingly dominated by the elderly unvaccinated.

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