Mega-Thread: Coronavirus Pandemic

[Edge-]

that's the major reason why they got it under control... not masks...

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7291980/

In South Korea, an aggressive ‘trace, test and treat’ programme was put in place. Members of the public were advised to avoid large gatherings and crowded places, and to follow quarantine protocols, such as wearing a face mask, handwashing and social distancing. Among these, wearing a face mask is considered to be one of the most effective preventive measures. According to a recent article, 63.2% of Koreans reported wearing a face mask when they are outside [3]. In another international survey, the reported rate of wearing face masks among Koreans was even higher (94%); this was the highest rate among 28 countries

Again, the data supports this.

[PhaelixWW]

that's a major reason why they got it under control... not masks...

Says whom? Do you have a citation for this?

[Forogil]

I mean, if you don't include the paragraph IMMEDIATELY following that one, sure. But that'd be a dishonest framing of the WHO guidance -

No, that was part of "in some settings", and I included the specific settings where it was recommended instead of the general statement that there is new guidance.

The discussion was about wearing a mask outside in non-crowded settings (by healthy individuals), and that's not a setting that is included in the new guidance.

[Edge-]

Really, you should only be masking up when running within 6 feet of another person. So if you’re passing people mask up, the rest of the time take it off as it traps a lot of moisture and can cause other issues.

Citation? What other issues? What negative impacts does moisture in the mask have? Is that due to poor masks or improper wearing?

Don't get me wrong, I agree largely that masks are really only needed when you'll be around folks, but if you're walking on the streets and people could be turning corners on you there's no reason not to keep it up until you're somewhere away from people.

- - - Updated - - -

No, that was part of "in some settings", and I included the specific settings where it was recommended instead of the general statement that there is new guidance.

The discussion was about wearing a mask outside in non-crowded settings (by healthy individuals), and that's not a setting that is included in the new guidance.

Final line in that section -

WHO encourages countries and community adopting policies on masks use in the general public to conduct good quality research to assess the effectiveness of this intervention to prevent and control transmission.

Why? Because we don't have good data on use by the general public, at least not in the west. So they can't recommend that without data, but all their guidance encourages mask use in almost all social settings.

[Granyala]

Because that 10% that don't can easily shit it up for the 90% who do. That's how pandemics work, if even a small number of people fuck up it has cascading effects.

Actually: no. Scientific studies have stated that R0 falls below 1 if even 50% of the people wear masks. You do not get exponential growth from 10% not wearing masks.

[PhaelixWW]

says logic... if you have aggressive surveillance and tell people to get tested if they have been anywhere close to someone who is known to be infected due to the violation of peoples privacy... do you think it makes no difference compared to in a country where that measure is illegal?

No, you need both in order for that to be terribly beneficial. Contact tracing by itself would not be enough.

[Zantos]

So, saw how stupid people are getting about covid thanks to facebook. A women set up a memorial for the ones who died to it. People are commenting saying "the American people have woken up. The cure can't be worse then the problem. We aren't living in fear of this hoax anymore".

My god. Do they not realize that Nothing has happened due to covid? We never went on lock down. Never had anything imposed. Some states did a Small lock down that accomplished nothing since it was so short. What is wrong with people?

Now there are more riots in other countries too over the pandemic. Its like the people of the world want to die.

[Forogil]

Citation? What other issues? What negative impacts does moisture in the mask have? Is that due to poor masks or improper wearing?

Mammals breathe out water, so the improper part is wearing it for too long, and wet conditions are favourable conditions for microorganism to amplify.

Why? Because we don't have good data on use by the general public, at least not in the west. So they can't recommend that without data, but all their guidance encourages mask use in almost all social settings.

In all settings where physical distancing cannot be maintained (and especially indoors).
(And people should still strive for physical distancing in those cases.)

[Granyala]

And yet it's entirely possible, even likely, that had you not had the mask-wearing adherence you do, the numbers might be climbing even faster.

Absolutely.
I'm not saying masks don't do anything, I'm just saying that blaming the current rise on a few anti-masker is simple incorrect.

- - - Updated - - -

Mammals breathe out water, so the improper part is wearing it for too long, and wet conditions are favourable conditions for microorganism to amplify.

To be fair: that doesn't happen in the typical timeframes people wear masks.
If you wear one multiple days w/o sanitizing it though: yes, you're asking for trouble.

[PhaelixWW]

Absolutely.
I'm not saying masks don't do anything, I'm just saying that blaming the current rise on a few anti-masker is simple incorrect.

That's fair.

[Granyala]

lol... what...

Medical personnel wears masks for many hours as part of their profession. Do you think a surgeon goes out mid operation to change his mask?

[PhaelixWW]

nope... if we had isolated people who were infected here and told people who were anywhere nearby them we wouldn't even have gotten to the point we are now... but they couldn't find people who were in their vicinity because that would be a violation of the right to privacy here... all they can do is trust that people seek medical attention if they have symptoms... a lot of people don't do that and think it's just a cold... meanwhile south korea aggressively chased down people who were close to those infected...

It's like you don't acknowledge that asymptomatic spread is a thing. People can spread it without knowing they're infected. No contact tracing is going to be anywhere near 100% effective at targeting everyone who may have contracted it, so some people will always slip through the cracks and continue to infect others. If people don't wear masks properly, that will only have a synergistic effect.

[Granyala]

It's like you don't acknowledge that asymptomatic spread is a thing. People can spread it without knowing they're infected. No contact tracing is going to be anywhere near 100% effective at targeting everyone who may have contracted it, so some people will always slip through the cracks and continue to infect others. If people don't wear masks properly, that will only have a synergistic effect.

Aye.
Contact tracing is best if you can actually verify nearly 100% of the chain. For that to be feasible you need a low enough case number for it.
Right now in Germany >75% of the infections can no longer be traced, that is bad.

[Granyala]

microorganisms don't decide to wait days until they appear...

They need time to multiply though. A single microbe won't cause any harm.

[Zan15]

I can't believe after 1000 pages this nonsense of mask and false information is still showing up.
Even more proof of the failures of this administration when it comes to COVID.

Can't even get that right in this country. 100k daily averages inc!

[tromage2]

I can't believe after 1000 pages this nonsense of mask and false information is still showing up.
Even more proof of the failures of this administration when it comes to COVID.

Can't even get that right in this country. 100k daily averages inc!

And you know what to do right? All countries in the world got this problem but we got our savior right here...

[Forogil]

Medical personnel wears masks for many hours as part of their profession. Do you think a surgeon goes out mid operation to change his mask?

I don't know, but I find that another question would be more important: should they?
There are studies suggesting they should change masks after 2 hour surgery, but only after operation is complete; https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...14031X18300809

But more importantly we don't really know if the surgeons even should wear medical mask!
Seriously!

It seems obvious that medical masks should be good for reducing the infections of patients, but the evidence is between lacking and negative: https://www.cadth.ca/use-surgical-ma...and-guidelines https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1853618/.
Maybe they would work if surgeons wore them correctly, or they made differently, or they actually changed them more often. Maybe the problem is elsewhere.

Obviously I don't recommend surgeons to change their practice based on a post here, and these studies focus on masks having bacteria grow on them which isn't relevant for flu, and covid. (Medical masks among health-care workers seem to reduce the spread of those viruses; and they cannot always maintain physical distancing.)

And even if the surgeons wearing masks don't help with reducing infections of patients it still protects the surgeon from getting blood etc splattered in their mouth.

[Zan15]

And you know what to do right? All countries in the world got this problem but we got our savior right here...

no savior but i am also not running around saying we beat covid, we don't need mask, we don't need doctors and scientist telling us what to do, that its a hoax, that we have more cases only cause we are testing more, etc etc insert even more embarrassing things the people of this country keep spouting about those very topics 6 months after it should have been settled.




sure seems like a few countries have it figured out

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireSt...ction-73896769

aiwan marks 200 days without domestic COVID-19 infection
Taiwan has hit 200 days without any domestically transmitted cases of COVID-19, highlighting the island’s continued success at keeping the virus under control even as cases surge in other parts of the world

Since the pandemic began, Taiwan has recorded 553 cases of COVID-19, and just seven deaths. While it has stopped domestic transmission, it continues to record new cases in people arriving from abroad.

- - - Updated - - -

And you know what to do right? All countries in the world got this problem but we got our savior right here...

Oh i see...your post....ah i insulted the dear leader....explains why you are being so adversarial

[Granyala]

I don't know, but I find that another question would be more important: should they?

I don't think it's a good idea, it takes quite a while to sterilize the surgeon again.
Would be unnecessary strain for the patient. I'm sure they change the masks for every new op.

[Cynep]

You two are just embroiled in a pointless argument that isn't actually proving or disproving anything.

"Nu uh, you needs to not exclude so much!" "Nu-uh, your date was 2 days out"

What a joke.

Yeah. Much pointless noise over a small simple statement. Back when daily cases looked like in the picture below, I said "it seems the world as a whole has peaked".



Surely looks like a peak to me, how about you? As later events showed, it wasn't the peak, but it's undeniable that it's a peak. I was a bit surprised when PhaelixWW vehemently attacked my little harmless post - at that point I still believed PhaelixWW was an honest poster, so instead of dismissing him outright like I would with a more obvious troll, I gave several honest replies to him and other posters, including the one after data showed that instead of an actual peak we had Twin Peaks, and instead of a decline we had a generally flat, somewhat fluctuating period.

I said all that in August. Now that enough time has passed, everyone with a brain can see my assessment was largely correct (I didn't expect the ongoing rise to dwarf the summer peaks that much though). But PhaelixWW just had to prove me wrong, and since all I said was a few simple undeniable facts while PhaelixWW's attacks originated from some fictional universe in which there's only one peak, TV show "Twin Peaks" never existed, expressions "next peak", "smaller peak" and "final peak" don't exist, you get my idea...

... so we had 1.5 months of PhaelixWW inventing irrelevant things and claiming I said something I didn't say and me calling PhaelixWW a liar for that. What a joke indeed. After a while I decided to stop wasting my time, take a break from MMOC and come back later.

And guess what I see, people are still debating mask wearing here. :|