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Not Just Another Post on the Efficacy of Mask Mandates in Slowing Wuhan Coronavirus Spread
My Ricochet friends will know the contempt I hold for “mask mandates” by state dictators, who think that by requiring all of their citizens to wear “face coverings” when indoors 100% of the time when people not in their household are present; and outdoors when “social-distancing” is not possible; that the spread of the virus will slow or maybe even stop. This is absurd! And today, I have finally been vindicated.
I just love the title of the post on Zero Hedge: The CDC is About to be Canceled by Google and Facebook for Covid Heresy. The reason for that cancelation? Here are a couple of quotes from the article.
The report, authored by at least a dozen medical doctors, PhD researchers, and, bizarrely, a handful of attorneys, examined how mask mandates across the US affected COVID cases and death rates.You’d think with all of the media propaganda about mask effectiveness… and all the virtue signaling, with politicians and reporters appearing on live TV wearing masks… that the data would prove incontrovertibly and overwhelmingly that masks have saved the world.
According to the CDC’s analysis, between March 1 and December 31 last year, statewide mask mandates were in effect in 2,313 of the 3,142 counties in the United States.
And, looking at the county-by-county data, the CDC concludes that mask mandates were associated with an average 1.32% decrease in the growth rates of COVID-19 cases and deaths during the first 100 days after the mask policy was implemented.
So, the effects of all those mask mandates by blue-state dictators on the spread of the Wuhan Coronavirus? Essentially zero! The figure of 1.32% is well within anyone’s margin of error, and not statistically significant. Just proves that I have been correct all along.
The rest of the article details all of the adverse consequences to the Public of all the mask mandates and lockdowns, which have been severe. Here in the state of Washington, our Dictator, Stupid Jay Inslee, has had a state-wide mask mandate in place since July of 2020! It is manifest, and corroborated every day in the “new case” totals, that Masks Do Not Work to Slow the Spread of the Wuhan Coronavirus. Unfortunately, the vast majority of the people of the state are abject slaves before their master, and dutifully wear their masks everywhere, even outdoors when they are manifestly not needed. I went to get my first dose of Covid vaccine yesterday. This is the line of people ahead of me at the clinic. Outdoors, in the 40-degree cold, with about a five-mph wind blowing. Every single person in that line, except me, was wearing their mask, and standing six feet apart. That line stretched all the way around the parking lot. See the lady in the red shirt? She and the person next to her were wearing their Northshore School District T-shirts. The teacher’s union has refused to return to the classroom, regardless of data stating that they are not at risk.
Will the blue-state dictators now listen to the great and wonderful, all-powerful CDC, and lift their useless mask mandates? My guess is that they will not.
Because absolute power, once gained, is rarely yielded.
[originally posted on RushBabe49.com]
Published in Healthcare
Given that you are linking ZeroHedge which has as many ads as one could imagine, let’s also link the report from the CDC:
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/pdfs/mm7010e3-H.pdf
I was waiting in line accompanying the RB, and I wasn’t wearing a mask. But because it was cold (I’m also mending from a broken nose), I decided to put my cloth face covering on just to cover my nose. That wasn’t enough, so I just went and waited in the car. I used to think people in Seattle were easy-going with common sense.
I’m not sure if that’s actually been true of any part of the Pacific Northwest since I left Oregon 30 years ago. Maybe to some degree in the areas east of the Cascades, but not to the west.
They are now a bunch of abjectly Compliant Karens. No one spoke to me about not wearing a mask, but maybe they were intimidated (I sure hope so).
As I saw someone else point this out, that 1.32% decease was only in the rate of growth, not in the overall rate. The overall rates of Covid cases has gone up an astounding ten-fold (1,000%) after the mask mandates were put in place. The same thing has happened all around the world. I think masks actually promote the spread of the virus. The CDC was grasping at straws to come up with those insignificant numbers. It was silly to add two decimal places to make it look like there is some sort of high degree of accuracy.
I recently was reminded that New York and New Jersey were the first States to institute mask mandates. They are also the States with the highest rate of death from the virus. They would probably have the highest rates of cases if not for the fact that most of their cases were active during the early part of the Pandemic when Covid tests were scarce. New York and New Jersey were only testing people who were severely sick. They were getting positive test results over 40 and 50 percent when the rest of the country was getting ten percent.
It was also not worth destroying the best economy in a gazillion years . . .
Correction: It was worth it to Democrats and the MSM because it helped Biden get elected almost as much as the fraud did . . .
Take a look at the top two charts on this tracking sheet (“Mask vs. Non-Mask States” and “Mask Usage vs. Positive Tests”):
COVID-19 Tracker (ftportfolios.com)
Thanks for the info! Those charts are not at all surprising.
The standard answer to explain away the data showing huge increases in Covid cases while mask mandates are in effect is “The cases would have even been a lot higher if not for the mask wearing.” This is the same logic as “Heads I win, tails you lose.” There is no possible result that is allowed to contradict the belief that masks work, except a 100% infection rate. If just one person keeps from getting infected, then it can be attributed to wearing a mask.
As long as that one person is a child…
The CDC report does not say what Zero Hedge claims it does.
The answer is to compare infection rates with and without as the graph does, as long as the states are reasonably comparable. You could even convert it to a number by using ratios, or to a percentage. But at times the effect would be negative without masks, and they wouldn’t have an answer for that. It does look as though from Dec 31 and on that the numbers were slightly higher without masks. But the mask isn’t everything. Comparing two states would be valid if everything else was the same, and for states that don’t have mandatory masking likely have a lot of other activities that are more open. The point is not which has the best numbers, that’s a liberal thing. The point is what policy can the citizens of your state manage with until the epidemic is over. Right now, we can probably handle a lot of hospitalizations if they’re not talking about that at the moment.
When I started noticing BLM masks awhile ago, I decided that masks could serve a political purpose for the disenfranchised electorate ( although this includes everyone, “some” are more aware of it than others). I ordered a “Make America Great Again” mask, and honestly I am a lot more cheerful now about wearing one. One day, when the hypocrites take off their mask, wouldn’t it be grand if about 70 million or so Americans kept them on?
In Michigan the state imposed more draconian regulations (no inside dining, etc.) on 11/15/20. Five days after the peak day for new cases of Covid. Given the incubation period, their actions came more than a week after the peak spread of the virus. But that doesn’t stop them from claiming credit.
But it does say that a 1% change in infection and death rates justify mask mandates and prohibiting on-site dining. I think that is a stretch. Their conclusions fit the narrative and were not, in my view, truly driven by the data. With minor affects like this, it is a matter of lies, damn lies, and statistics: You can make the numbers say whatever you want.
Reminds me of a book I encountered in a High School math class: “How To Lie With Statistics.”
The answer is to compare infection rates with and without as the graph does, as long as the states are reasonably comparable. You could even convert it to a number by using ratios, or to a percentage. But at times the effect would be negative without masks, and they wouldn’t have an answer for that. It does look as though from Dec 31 and on that the numbers were slightly higher without masks. But the mask isn’t everything. Comparing two states would be valid if everything else was the same, and for states that don’t have mandatory masking likely have a lot of other activities that are more open. The point is not which has the best numbers, that’s a liberal thing. The point is what policy can the citizens of your state manage with until the epidemic is over. Right now, we can probably handle a lot of hospitalizations if they’re not talking about that at the moment.
[oops, duplicate comment]
And to be fair, conservatives like me have been able to live with the stupid mask mandates. But what I resent was the hysterical mass lockdowns that destroyed so many small business. Honestly, I think that the mass lockdowns were politically motivated – to some extent; therefore, they has been one of the biggest governmental crimes of this century.
You have “been able to live with” the mask mandate? Think about that. Do you wish to live with that mask mandate, literally forever? Because the more of the public that gets used to living with a dehumanizing cover over their face, the less likely it becomes that the Health Nazis will ever lift that mandate. The quote below is from an article today on the KOMO-Seattle Web site. The speaker is a doctor at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the U. of Washington. Bold-face mine.
See? They are going to find every possible reason in the book to keep the public in chains, and, believe me, that mask mandate is “chains of oppression” to me. The State of Washington relaxed mask-wearing rules for vaccinated people in the state last week, but King County, the home of Seattle, immediately said “not so fast”, and retained mask mandates! Businesses in KC are afraid of the State, so every one has maintained mask requirements for ALL customers.
But we already know that Washington State, and especially Seattle, are bonkers.
Stay tuned for more Washington State news at RushBabe49.com.
Yesterday I felt the rush of freedom!
I was in an unfamiliar Wal-Mart in a suburb of Cleveland and a guy walking in next to me did not have a mask on. I expected the greeter to immediately remind him to put his mask on, but no! The guy just kept going in as if nothing was awry. I figured it was just an anomaly and a minute later I noticed that one of the store employees was not wearing her mask, either. Just a coincidence, I thought. But here and there I started encountering other shoppers who were walking around unmasked. Not with their masks hanging down under their chins, but no mask at all. I estimate that it was about one out of every 15 people.
This might not seem like much to some of you, depending on where you live. But here in Cleveland, it is commonplace for individuals to walk in bright sunshine, completely alone, and wear a mask. Or completely alone in their cars, or jogging, or biking. It’s unreal. The Ohio mask mandate does not even call for wearing a mask outdoors unless you cannot physically distance from crowds. People here are cautious (or scared) to an astonishingly high degree. In nearly a year I haven’t been in any establishment where people were unmasked, with the exception of a couple small gas stations, and the lobby of an automobile junkyard.
After I saw the sixth or seventh unmasked person at the Wal-Mart, I knew something different was going on. I slowly reached up to pull my mask down from my smothered visage, breathing a big breath of fresh air. I suddenly felt guilty and looked around to see if anyone was watching. Nobody noticed… Nobody told me to mask-up….. Nobody cared! I began walking down the aisles as I felt the blood of freedom pulsing through my veins! I’m not kidding. I started humming the song “I’m Free” by the Who.
This is the first sign I’ve personally seen around here that things are changing. People might be jumping the gun by a couple of weeks. Our State’s mask mandate is set to be repealed on June 2nd, only because the Ohio legislature over-rode the pin-head Governor’s veto for a power grab by a 2/3rds vote. Hallelujah! Can I get an Amen on that?
Amen! And your area is freer than ours. I am mostly the only person in whatever store I go to with no mask.
I can’t speak for Phoenix where I lived up until last August, but where I am now, the nearest Walmart store hasn’t required masks – and only had one entrance available, etc – since like October or something.