| You don't have to tell me it was hell, I was there. People, the government and scientists were all spreading misinformation depending on what the official messaging was at the time. Case in point: Early on, the government was saying "Masks are not effective at stopping COVID-19" due to them wanting to control supply. When that happened, there was a large number of studies that came out showing just that. When you looked at the methodology, it was "Mask over mouth, cough into Petri dish" and see if any COVID was detectable in dish. Also "Virus particle size is much smaller than openings on mask" When the government changed it's stance, all of those were retracted.
It took the WHO 2 YEARS to change their stance and say that COVID-19 was airborne: >In the spring of 2020, as covid-19 took hold, confusion reigned among scientists, doctors, public health experts, and others. Many insisted the spread of the new virus was through the air, yet the World Health Organization refused to use the terms “airborne” or “aerosol”1 in the context of covid-19 until 2021.2 This had repercussions as the world debated mask wearing (and what types of masks were suitable) and whether indoor spaces were a factor in infection. >Now, four years later and after two years of deliberation by experts,3 WHO has altered its definition of the “airborne” spread of infectious pathogens in the hope of avoiding the confusion and miscommunication that characterised the first year of the pandemic—and threatened attempts to control the virus’s spread. https://www.bmj.com/content/385/bmj.q985 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22280304 |