Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by cthalupa 1666 days ago
If wearing masks were solely a matter of your own personal protection, I would agree. Particularly since being vaccinated nearly eliminates your chances of having a serious covid infection.

But vaccines do not prevent you from catching and transmitting covid to others. And some people are precluded from getting vaccinated for legitimate medical reasons, same as they are precluded from other vaccines. A vaccinated person wearing a proper mask is less likely to transmit the virus to an unvaccinated person than they would be without the mask.

1 comments

Your argument says we should be doing this forever. There will always be viruses that we transmit to each other. Always was. We never took this kind of moral grandstanding before. Why are we doing this for this one specific virus?

I’m sorry, your argument just doesn’t make sense. You are arguing we should always be masked forever.

>Your argument says we should be doing this forever.

Yes, I did say this is a possibility. I don't think it's likely, but it is a possibility.

>We never took this kind of moral grandstanding before. Why are we doing this for this one specific virus?

This is the first virus with this sort of reach in the era of modern science. It's pretty simple - we have never before had a virus that has infected and killed this many people while also having an understanding that masking cuts down on transmission rates.

>I’m sorry, your argument just doesn’t make sense.

You disagreeing with it doesn't mean it doesn't make sense, it just means that you, for whatever reason, value people not having to wear a mask over cutting down on the loss of human life during a global pandemic.

>You are arguing we should always be masked forever.

If we live in a state of perpetual covid-esque pandemic from now until forever, yes, that would be a perfectly prudent thing to do.