NJ fan wrote:
You admit masks offer benefits to both the wearer and others. Even "limited protection for the healthy wearer" (your words) could have helped tremendously. We went from 24 cases in February to over 3.5 million today. Did you ever stop to think that if we were all told to wear masks in February or March that we wouldn't have 3.5 million cases in total as of right now???
Also, you are so ignorant you don't realize that you are arguing in support of the decisions that Trump made. I've heard die-hard Trump supporters make the same arguments as you to justify Trump's handling of the crisis. I never knew you were a Trump supporter!
If you were paying close attention to the experts like Fauci months ago, the primary way to prevent the spread is through social distancing -- keeping 2 meters or 6 feet apart from everyone else.
Masks are supplemental secondary importance measure on top of that, like frosting on a cake. Experts have been saying this for months.
I'm not sure I would say "limited protection" translates to "helped tremendously". The experts say that the cloth coverings they recommended in April are good for "source control" (protecting others), and not so much "target control" (protecting the wearer).
Regarding 3.5 million cases in total, I stopped to think that this is primarily due to a combination of other factors than the secondary recommendation of public wearing cloth coverings on their face:
- When Trump announced the new CDC guidelines for cloth face coverings to help prevent the spread (in addition to the primary recommendation of social distancing), he undermined the guideline by emphasizing the optional nature of the recommendation, and, leading by example, said he would not wear one. What if he had strongly encouraged the wearing of masks in public, and led by example by having him and his administration wear masks? I've seen one study show that 80% compliance of masks that are 60% effective would be enough to reverse the curve. This doesn't work if 35% of the population don't wear masks.
- After many states implemented stay-at-home orders and temporary lockdowns, the CDC gave a phased set of recommendations based on criteria to decide when and how to slowly re-open safely. Meanwhile Trump threatened to withhold state funding for states that don't re-open by Trumps arbitrary deadline, and sent out tweets like "Liberate Michigan, Minnesota, and Virginia". What if Trump had endorsed and enforced the CDC guidelines for gradual re-opening?
- Is there any state which re-opened after meeting the criteria in the CDC guidelines? Maybe only one -- the hardest hit New York.
- Leading by example, Trump has organized several super-spreader events, against all recommendations, where many of his supporters gather in enclosed spaces and huddle next to each other without masks, shouting and shedding virus within a 6 foot radius, with every breath they exhale.
Of course, I do not doubt that if everyone wore N-95 respirator masks, which the experts say are very good at "target control", with a tight fitting seal around the face that captures 95% of airborne particles, and avoided touching the outside of the mask, the case count would drop dramatically within weeks. If we had started manufacturing billions of these masks in December, this might have been the best option for the general public. As the experts have been telling us for months, we had a limited supply of these kinds of masks, and they were recommending for months to reserve these superior masks for the medical workers due to shortages in supply. Even if we had just mimicked many of the Asian countries, who had previously been shell-shocked by SARs and MERs outbreaks, and just wore cloth masks as a matter of culture without waiting for a medical recommendation, we could have kept the spread manageable with a Swedish style response due to partially effective source control. This requires a strong, federally coordinated plan and execution -- and not a cheerleader on the sidelines saying "Go team!".
But if the US president is ambivalent in his support of mask wearing, his supporters will naturally follow suit. And if the president blames others (Fauci, the WHO, China, state governors, etc.) for his many failures to provide a strong leadership, his supporter will naturally follow suit.
Not sure which Trump decisions you are referring to. Whenever Trump re-echoed the words of Fauci and other medical experts and made decisions recommended by the medical experts in the Task Force, I supported these decisions.