Why masks work and why they’re

Arcata CA

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WHY MASKS WORK; Whenever someone talks, laughs, sneezes, coughs, or sings, that person sends out tiny respiratory droplets into the air. These droplets are so small that you may not see them, but they are there. If that person is infected with the virus that causes COVID-19, the droplets sent out into the air carry the virus. When someone else is close by (within six feet), that person can breathe in the droplets that the other person is pushing out. When you wear a mask properly — over your nose and mouth — it blocks the tiny virus-filled respiratory droplets that you push out. That means that there are fewer of those respiratory droplets for someone else to breathe in. If both people wear masks, it cuts down on the respiratory droplets going back and forth even more. It’s important to remember that COVID-19 is often transmitted by people who are not even showing any symptoms or by people who haven’t developed symptoms yet. That is in part why it’s so important that more people wear masks — to reduce the transmission from people who may not realize they are infected with the virus. Masks cannot stop every respiratory droplet exchange, but they have been proven through scientific studies to dramatically reduce the severity of illness because there is less virus being exchanged. Put simply: If you wear a mask, you emit less virus. If the person you are with also is wearing a mask, that person also has a barrier — to keep from putting out the droplets and to keep from breathing in your droplets. There are now dozens of studies, that show that mask wearing can help with the spread of viruses, including the one that causes COVID-19. Below are some highlights of the vast body of research available showing that masks work: * A large-scale randomized trial,3 which was led by researchers at Stanford, Yale and the University of California at Berkley and published at the end of August, studied more than 340,000 people in Bangladesh — the largest of its kind in a real-world setting. The paper found that a community-based mask program, including distribution and promotion, led to fewer people testing positive for COVID-19. Surgical masks prevented one in three symptomatic infections in those 60 and older. * In two different evidence reviews, one published in February 2021 in the Journal of the American Medical Association, and the other in January 2021 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers reviewed more than 160 studies. Both concluded that masks are effective at slowing the spread of the virus. The Journal of American Medical Association authors noted that wearing a multi-layer cloth mask blocked as much as 50% to 70% of exhaled small droplets and particles. In the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences review, scientists said that “Nonmedical masks … have been effective in reducing transmission of respiratory viruses; and places and time periods where mask usage is required or widespread have shown substantially lower community transmission.” Another Journal of American Medical Association study also published in February 2021, stated, “Compelling data now demonstrate that community mask wearing is an effective nonpharmacologic intervention to reduce the spread of this infection, especially as source control to prevent spread from infected persons, but also as protection to reduce wearers’ exposure to infection.” Wearing of face masks becomes even more important as variants of the virus mutate. In short, it is now very clear that when it comes to slowing the spread of COVID-19, masks work. Pediatricians recommend mask wearing for children older than age 2 to prevent the spread of COVID-19 Pediatricians recommend mask wearing for children older than age 2 to prevent the spread of COVID-19 Masks don’t just work for adults. They also work for kids. In July 2021, the American Academy of Pediatrics strongly endorsed the use of infection control procedures, including wearing masks for children. The best thing for children is for them to be in school, five days a week. Wearing masks allows children to be in school consistently with less risk of contracting and transmitting the virus and less risk of quarantine. “Face masks can be safely worn by all children 2 years of age and older, including the vast majority of children with underlying health conditions, with rare exception,” the American Academy of Pediatrics said. Watch a high-speed laser light video that shows how respiratory droplets are emitted To see how respiratory droplets are emitted when speaking vs. when wearing a mask, scientists published a video of a high-speed laser-light video in the New England Journal of Medicine. The video shows droplets flashing when participants said the words, “stay healthy,” without a mask. The video then shows the lack of droplets pushed out when the participant is wearing a mask. Masks Reduce Airborne Transmission— Infectious aerosol particles can be released during breathing and speaking by asymptomatic infected individuals. No masking maximizes exposure, whereas comprehensive masking results in the least exposure. WHY MASK MANDATES ARE NOT TYRANNY; It is not always clear why anti-maskers think government orders requiring face coverings in public spaces or those put in place by private businesses violate their constitutional rights, much less what they think those rights are. But most of the mistaken objections fall into two categories: Mandatory masks violate the First Amendment right to speech, assembly, and especially association and mandatory masks violate a person’s constitutional right to liberty and to make decisions about their own health and bodily integrity. They’re not mutually exclusive claims: A lawsuit filed by four Florida residents against Palm Beach County, for example, argued that mask mandates “interfere with … personal liberty and constitutional rights,” such as freedom of speech, right to privacy, due process, and the “constitutionally protected right to enjoy and defend life and liberty.” The lawsuit asked the court to issue a permanent injunction against the county’s mask mandate. On July 27, the Court declined to issue an injunction against the mask mandate. Citing Jacobsen v. Massachusetts, the Court found that “no constitutional right is infringed by the Mask Ordinance’s mandate … and that the requirement to wear such a covering has a clear rational basis based on the protection of public health.” More to the point, the Court continued, “constitutional rights and the ideals of limited government do not … allow (citizens) to wholly shirk their social obligation to their fellow Americans or to society as a whole…. After all, we do not have a constitutional right to infect others.” What the First Amendment does – and doesn’t – do The First Amendment protects freedom of speech, press, petition, assembly and religion. There are two reasons why mask mandates don’t violate the First Amendment. First, a mask doesn’t keep you from expressing yourself. At most, it limits where and how you can speak. Constitutional law scholars and judges call these “time, place, and manner” restrictions. If they do not discriminate on the basis of the content of the speech, such restrictions do not violate the First Amendment. An example of a valid time, place and manner restriction would be a law that limits political campaigning within a certain distance of a voting booth. Additionally, the First Amendment, like all liberties ensured by the Constitution, is not absolute. All constitutional rights are subject to the goverment’s authority to protect the health, safety and welfare of the community. This authority is called the “police power.” The Supreme Court has long held that protecting public health is sufficient reason to institute measures that might otherwise violate the First Amendment or other provisions in the Bill of Rights. In 1944, in the case of Prince v. Massachusetts, for example, the Supreme Court upheld a law that prohibited parents from using their children to distribute religious pamphlets on public streets. The right to liberty Some anti-maskers object that masks violate the right to liberty. The right to liberty, including the right to make choices about one’s health and body, is essentially a constitutional principle of individual autonomy, neatly summarized as “My body, my choice.” The 1905 case of Jacobsen v. Massachusetts shows why mask mandates don’t violate any constitutional right to privacy or health or bodily integrity. In that case, the Supreme Court upheld a smallpox vaccination requirement in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The court said that the vaccination requirement did not violate Jacobsen’s right to liberty or “the inherent right of every freeman to care for his own body and health in such way as to him seems best.” As the court wrote, “There are manifold restraints to which every person is necessarily subject for the common good. On any other basis, organized society could not exist with safety to its members.” In a 1995 New York case, a state court held that an individual with active tuberculosis could be forcibly detained in a hospital for appropriate medical treatment. Even if you assume that mask mandates infringe upon what the Supreme Court calls “fundamental rights,” or rights that the court has called the “very essence of a scheme of ordered liberty,” it has consistently ruled states can act if the restrictions advance a compelling state interest and do so in the least restrictive manner. Rights are conditional As the Jacobsen ruling and the doctrine of time, place and manner make clear, the protection of all constitutional liberties rides upon certain necessary – but rarely examined – assumptions about communal and public life. One is that constitutional rights – whether to liberty, speech, assembly, freedom of movement or autonomy – are held on several conditions. The most basic and important of these conditions is that our exercise of rights must not endanger others (and in so doing violate their rights) or the public welfare. This is simply another version of the police power doctrine. Unfortunately, a global pandemic in which a serious and deadly communicable disease can be transmitted by asymptomatic carriers upsets that background and justifies a wide range of reasonable restrictions on our liberties. Believing otherwise makes the Constitution a suicide pact – and not just metaphorically. I think it’s also important to remind everyone that we already have laws in this country that exist to protect society as a whole; have to stop at a red light, can’t drive 100 mph down the highway while sipping on a bottle of Jim Beam, have to keep your child fastened in a car seat, among others. I fail to see how any of these “mandates” has led to the loss of our human rights.