narvik

Just read the first few posts of THIS thread!

Sadly, around these parts, people have given up on proper mask wearing (store clerks not having any masks at all, or nose not covered, etc.)

FlyBitcoin

This and other events of this week are pointing to two things likely returning back to normal sooner than later...
1. Medical journals move back behind their paywalls, and they release carefully-worded abstracts.
2. No online release of study results prior to peer review. If this happens we will have a quiet few weeks.

pgh234

The tune has not changed! I endlessly presented and tried fostering educated discussion on the topic with facts and logic about how silly wearing masks are...and my response that I received was about as productive as arguing with an immature middle-school bully.

Therefore, while you sit here in your COVID-19 echo chamber thinking you have "won" the argument...the rest of us have simply stopped wasting our time trying to present science and facts to you.

radonc1

Thank goodness!!

I have gottn very tired of having to dissect out the truth within the publication from the headlines that are published for clicks rather than accuracy.

What is especially disappointing is that well known medical journals have participated in this pseudo-scientific political warfare

Loren Pechtel

Early in the crisis we didn't know about the asymptomatic transmission issue.

LonghornDXB

Nope, we knew about it in February....

Maybe not in mid January when it first started, but by mid February, news pieces were out there claiming people were getting infected even without symptoms, which explained the videos from China of healthy looking people being dragged to quarantine.

cmtlatitudes

Regardless of the legitimacy of the reasons, if masks are indeed as beneficial as now being portrayed, the initial approach by the scientific and medical community was misguided. Americans don't respond well to being 'handled' or being intentionally mislead to serve a greater good or having "truth" doled out in small increments by public officials. At the most basic level, by downplaying the public benefit initially, the community perpetrated a fraud on the american people during a public health crisis.

It doesn't really matter how legitimate or important the reasons were. Or even if Americans rationally understand the great need of why the importance was downplayed. The question going forward will be "well, did you lie to me then or are you lying to me now? or do you just always lie to me?"

The predictable result is CDC now has a credibility crisis with a large slice of the populace. CDC's guidance can no longer be taken at face value. People question whether CDC's guidelines and the available scientific data and current conclusions in the community sufficiently protect their personal health. Or whether in fact masks are simply Hygiene Theater. And how they would even know.

I don't know how CDC restores its credibility at this point or even what the first steps would be to doing so. It's a much larger problem than mask guidance.

fransknorge

It is not just the CDC: same for WHO, same for the French health minister, same in UK, ....

BLV

From the horse’s mouth aka an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins.

BLV

What happened to “stay home & save grandma”?

cmtlatitudes

The UK appears to disagree with the Hopkins epidemiologist. All I can do is shake my head at this point and ponder the lack of consistent messaging. Just came across CNN's news feed minutes ago at 12:50PM:

UK health secretary asks people not to attend anti-racism protests due to coronavirus threat
From CNN's Milena Veselinovic

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock said he was "appalled" by the death of George Floyd in the US, but asked the public not to attend the planned anti-racism protests this weekend because "coronavirus remains a real threat."

"I want to say something to you as Health Secretary. Like so many I am appalled by the death of George Floyd an I understand why people are deeply upset, but we are still facing a health crisis, and coronavirus remains a real threat, and the reason that is vital that people stick to the rules this weekend is to protect themselves and their family from this horrific disease," Matt Hancock said on Friday."

So please for the safety of your loved ones do not attend large gatherings, including demonstrations of more than six people," Hancock said during the Downing Street coronavirus briefing. According to current coronavirus restrictions in the UK, up to six people are allowed to meet outdoors if they stay two meters — or about six feet — apart.

cmtlatitudes

And also in the last 30 minutes, new WHO guidance on masks. (Also from the CNN live newsfeed)

WHO shifts guidance on masks and urges governments to encourage people to wear them

The World Health Organization (WHO) is now calling for nations to encourage the general public to wear fabric masks in areas where there continues to be intense spread of the novel coronavirus. All health workers and caregivers are also encouraged to wear masks during their shifts.

"WHO advises that governments should encourage the general public to wear masks where there is widespread transmission and physical distancing is difficult, such as on public transport, in shops or in other confined or crowded environments," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a media briefing in Geneva on Friday.

Here's what the WHO's new recommendations say:

• "In areas with community transmission, we advise that people aged 60 years or over, or those with underlying conditions, should wear a medical mask in situations where physical distancing is not possible," Tedros said.
• "In areas with widespread transmission, WHO advises medical masks for all people working in clinical areas of a health facility, not only workers dealing with patients with Covid-19," WHO's Director-General added.
• WHO recommends that where there is widespread transmission, limited capacity to contain Covid-19 outbreaks and physical distancing of at least a meter can not be achieved, then governments should encourage their public to wear a fabric mask, Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO's technical lead for coronavirus response and head of the emerging diseases and zoonoses unit, told CNN.

The new guidance recommends for these fabric masks — which can be homemade — to be at least three layers: an inner layer of an absorbent material such as cotton; a middle layer that acts like a filter or barrier, such as non-woven material polypropylene; and an outer layer of a non-absorbent material, such as polyester or polyester blend.

Van Kerkhove also said to avoid materials that may be silk, stretchy or porous.

Remember: These updated recommendations announced on Friday, are a shift from what WHO previously advised on masks, which was to not wear them if you are not sick or not caring for someone who is sick, in an effort to keep masks available for health workers. Tedros added that the new guidance was updated based on evolving evidence.

BLV

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/32432250-post5412.html

The_Bouncer

It has been announced in Austria that the legal requirement for masks to be worn in retail outlets is being dropped from June 15. The absurd and largely ignored requirement for them to be worn when walking to and from restaurant tables (but obviously not actually at the table) is also being dropped.

Masks will only be required on public transport, in medical settings such as doctors' surgeries or pharmacies and when receiving services requiring contact such as hairdressing (it looks like I may have to trim my own beard).

Other than that, masks are basically a thing of the past here. At least in my home town, the percentage of people wearing them when not legally required to is definitely less than 1% and probably actually nearer to 0.1%.

Some people were really into the idea to begin with, because they saw it as a way of being allowed to resume their lives, but the novelty has worn off pretty quickly. I suspect that this will also happen in other countries.

jmastron

And Austria, like several other countries, bent the curve all the way down to a near-zero number of cases. Austria is currently at ~30 new cases/day, or 3 per million people. The US is at ~22000 new cases/day, or 73 per million people. Like I've said before, there are a *lot* of things you can do to open more/most things up and reduce measures when you push the cases all the way down (because the number of infected people walking around that don't know it yet is much lower) that you can't when content to plateau at close to the peak rates. And, wait for it...wearing masks and taking all the other distancing measures seriously is an awfully good way to get to near-zero.