Coronavirus in the United States - news and thoughts

You are not putting anyone in jeopardy by not wearing a mask. If you go out and sneeze/cough in someone's face...yeah you might spread it to them and a mask would probably help in the event someone is a jerk and would do that. But if you sneeze/cough in your sleeve. You are not spreading anything to anyone at the store. But theater makes some feel better.

 

Because no one works in grocery stores?

It is okay to watch out for the people around you. It is even okay to slightly inconvenience yourself to provide a small benefit for your neighbor, encouraged even.

 

In that article on the study on Bangladesh, I see this:

"distributing free masks to households, providing information about their importance and reinforcing their use in the community."

More on that from the pre-print:

That, my friends, is outreach.

Haven't read the whole study, but I wonder how much of the instruction on mask usage led to better social distancing and to what extent that may have been a factor in the reduced percentage.

Go GATORS!
,WESGATORS

 

That Bangladesh mask study doesn't show what people want it to show. Think if a vaccine trial showed 11% efficacy. Based on the 95% confidence intervals, we don't even know if surgical mask efficacy is more than 0% and let alone cloth masks(much less efficacy) which are the vast, vast majority of masks used in the US. Also, this study is the definition of p-hacking. Masks useless under the age of 50, I guess that would be ok with me. Let's mandate all people over 50 to mask up. Zero data showing masks work under 50.

 

Early during the pandemic, grocery store workers were 5X more likely to get infected with COVID than others. Studies like the one published in November, 2020 lead to more studies like this one that came out last April to show how to effectively slow the spread in grocery stores.

Grocery stores and Wal-mart aren't the biggest spreaders of COVID, but do make up a percentage of infections. All customers and workers wearing masks could prevent some of this spread, which would prevent people from bringing COVID back home with them.

 

large jump in testing of kids prior to school started pushed their reported numbers up. It is apparent that a booster is needed to maintain efficacy versus catching delta if preventing infection is the goal.

 

The Bangladesh study showed a 30% adoption in proper surgical mask wearing showed a 10% reduction in infections as compared to areas that didn't wear masks. How is that confirmation bias? It's not some, small scale study with just 100 people. We're talking villages and a total population studied of over 170,000. You just call it p-hacking because it proves you were wrong about mask usage, and you just want to whine about it.

Most surgical masks are polyester or some poly fabric. They are woven tighter and allow less to pass through that other fabrics such as cotton, but the COVID virus is transmitted as part of larger, aerosol particles that are likely to be stopped by both poly fabrics and natural fabrics.

The big issue with masks here in the States are the people who don't wear them, or people who don't wear them properly. A mask that hasn't been washed in weeks and doesn't cover one's nose is just as bad as not wearing a mask at all. But as the Bangladesh people proved, when worn properly, masks slow the spread of COVID.

 

If you are healthy…you are not spreading Covid to any worker. If
you are presymptomatic. You are not spreading Covid to a worker by not wearing a mask. It is just not a way this virus spreads mask or no mask.

Now maybe you are presymptomatic and decide to go hang with a worker in the break room for an hour…you might spread it. Mask or no mask.

 

you still are failing to understand that delta is different, the amount of virus one has to be exposed to is much lower with the delta variant. if you are infected, and show no symptoms, you can spread it by merely breathing. that is proven fact and not subject to interpretation. it is why I wear a mask, for others, in the event that I am asym but infected

 

If someone is afraid for their health they should wear an N95 mask and ONLY an N95 wherever they go. That way they won’t have to worry about whether or not anyone else is wearing a mask or not. Seems pretty simple.

Today is the first day in a month that we have had empty beds on the Covid floors that are staying empty and not being immediately filled by patients holding in the ER. The patients I have today are still pretty sick and a couple need constant surveillance but the census is down and we’ve changed over one floor from Covid to general patient care. We’re definitely on the down side of the spike. It happened pretty quick just like it was predicted to do.

 

Any study showing only masks work for the elderly was trying to find a conclusion because the data didn't tell them what they hoped. Anyone using common sense would see that. But that is the problem for many on here. Sure lets mask up anyone over 50. Kids and anyone under 50 are free to do what they want. There, you happy? I am. I'm under 50. Let's follow the "science" LOL. Now we have the "we don't wear them properly" routine. Keep on making up crap. And then the "Bangladesh people proved, when worn properly, masks slow the spread of covid." LOL. Only those over 50. This is too funny. Love a good joke on a friday afternoon.

 

Once again the masks are as much or more about preventing spread from the infected vs providing protection against uninfected.

Curious you reject these studies based upon your interpretation of the statistics, yet elsewhere you just present random data from 2 completely different data sets, like different states, to try to prove masks don't make a difference.

Actually this data isn't inconsistent with what you stated elsewhere. In this one the benefits were marginal, instruction was given and all masks were surgical. Contrast that to here where people wear cloth and scarfs, with their nose sticking out, and pull it up and down 356 times a day.

 

At my sister's hospital the largest influx is overflow LTAC patients. It looks like soon they will cut the bonus pay for Critical Care and ICU nurses so she's hammering it while the getting is good.

 

You can wear one. But it is not doing anything while you are at the store. Unless you are planning to spray someone in the face.

 

Here is just a few issues with the "study". We have no idea what prior disease exposure was in each of these villages and village cohorts at the start. No way to know if one had a big wave and another had not. To claim that masks caused any given variance in outcome, you need to isolate masks as the variable. This study did not do that. Physical distancing increased by 5.2 percentage points might've influenced the numbers. That's the problem. "Guessing" that masks were the answer is just that, guessing. Many other factors as well. Let's not even discuss the "80% self-reported wearing a mask" but the study observed "about 51% out of the more than 152k individuals we observed were wearing a mask". The second wave of surveillance found that mask wearing "dropped to 26%, with 20% wearing masks that covered their mouth and nose.".

But we should accept self reporting of symptoms after seeing that the reported numbers are drastically different. I'll go ahead and call this "study" not useful.

 

I wear a mask to protect you. You wear one to protect me. When we all wear a mask, we protect each other. Data and figures don't lie, but liars figure. The data from Bangladesh shows that when 30% of the population wears a mask properly, total infections in the area drop 10%. There were probably people that wore masks that got infected, because the mask only provides marginal protection for the wearer, unless said mask is a N-95 mask. Which none of the Bangladesh masks were.

Having people only 50 wear a mask properly would slow the spread of COVID in a similar fashion as everyone wearing one in Bangladesh. Since the percent of people in the US over 50 is about 34%. It would be helpful. What would be even more helpful? Everyone wearing a mask properly.

And making stuff up? Here's an article from Philadelphia that said 50% don't wear a mask properly. Washington D.C., about 40%. And from the west coast, Seattle. From this artice:

There’s a catch, however. You have to wear the mask correctly and dispose of it properly, or you might actually increase the infection risk to yourself or others.

“That’s what I see all the time,” Griffin said, NPR reported. “That’s why in the studies, masks fail — people don’t use them (correctly). They touch the front of it. They adjust it. They push it down somehow to get their nose stuck out.”
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How are you going to figure your way out of this one?

 

Already answered. Maybe read the study and see what was observed versus reported. I'll wait.

 

If only you were this disciplined in your examination of studies you like

 

I am. You just don't like the outcome.

 

The the British Long COVID study you said was definitive in saying it's only a small issue despite the fact that study itself said more than 1 in 4 medical offices never coded for long COVID, and many others were wildly inconsistent with their medical coding. And the conclusion of the study is Brit medical centers need to do better at coding consistently. But you saw it as long COVID only affects a small number.

The Bangladesh study is what it is. The figures don't lie. If 30% of people wear masks correctly and consistently, the total number of COVID cases in those areas were 10% less than in areas that didn't mask. You don't like the outcome, so you whine and make stuff up why the figures are lying. But again, figures don't lie.