[kevinmrose]

So they still don't know if masks work? Can we get a concrete answer on this at some point? It seems like this type of back and forth messaging is the problem. Maybe we should all apologize to people who questioned the need to wear masks if we still don't know whether or not they're effective.

[ethanbond]

Correct, we still do not really know whether masks at a population level tend to reduce transmission. A big, big part of the problem is that it’s very hard to know how many people are wearing masks, how consistently, whether they change their behavior when they do, etc etc.

What we probably know is that if 100% of the population wore masks 100% correctly 100% of the time and kept 100% of their prior behavior, it would probably reduce transmission more than 0% for some pathogens.

This is another way of saying, “we don’t really know,” and it gives you an idea of why it’s hard to figure it out.

The ambush on “masks don’t work” was because it seems almost certainly the case that masks don’t hurt, and it’s likely the case that if masks have any benefit, that benefit will be proportional to levels of compliance, so if we get to choose between levels of compliance, higher is probably better.

My personal view is that after half the population came to view “no masks” as a part of their political identity, the overall pushiness on masks probably netted out to negative, but this is not blame I can assign to CDC et al.

[sampo]

> we still do not really know whether masks at a population level tend to reduce transmission

We don't know this about condoms, either.

https://jech.bmj.com/content/65/2/100

[ethanbond]

That is fascinating! Science is really difficult :)

[kevinmrose]

Wouldn't it have just been easier to explain it than to lie to the public and then continue to deny and defend the lying after it's already been exposed?

[ethanbond]

What lying? CDC et al never said masks don’t work. I don’t know how many times I need to repeat this.

[zdragnar]

The CDC may not have said those words, but the surgeon general absolutely did. There was plenty of conflicting messaging around the effectiveness of cloth masks as well.

[ethanbond]

Yep, already mentioned that USSG said that. Note that he never comes up in these discussions as someone who lied though. No one I know seemed to even note what he said. Everyone seems (correctly) more fixated on CDC/NIH which were dominating the public messaging.

[zdragnar]

It's hard to read the nuance in official messaging when the unofficial messaging has none. Welcome to the Mandela effect.

[kevinmrose]

I don't know if we can call it outright lying, but going from "you don't need a mask" to basically saying you shouldn't be allowed in public without one seems like either incompetence or corruption on the CDC's part. You can argue semantics all you want to try to justify their behavior, but that is what people see and it doesn't increase trust or confidence in them as an organization.

[ethanbond]

Yes, people see that because they think authority figures have some Magic Answer Box that they’re pulling or withholding answers from, rather than the reality which is that our understanding of the situation was shifting day by day.

The Magic Answer Box people are demanding that they be trusted with nuance and detail and yet continuously demonstrate Magic Answer Box thinking in the face of nuanced and detailed information.

[maxerickson]

We also went from a few hundred identified cases per day in February to ~25,000 per day identified in late March/April.

[sampo]

> So they still don't know if masks work?

It took decades to get medical doctors to start washing their hands [1]. It took decades to get people to use seat belts in cars [2]. It took decades to accept that tobacco smoking causes lung cancer [3].

Masks work [4], but it will take decades before this is accepted through the chain of command in the medical profession, and not only by front line science.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis#Conflict_with...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seat_belt#History

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_of_tobacco#Hist...

[4] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/masks-are-a-prove...

[newsclues]

Fluid mechanics are well understood.

There are people who understand how air moves, and have a good understanding of how viruses travel.

Masks have been hailed as a silver bullet (so that people don't have to get active and eat well and be healthy, and government and businesses don't have to upgrade HVAC systems), to the point where people think they work outside!

Are there masks that work? Yes. Is that cheap surgical mask or a cotton one really effective? No.