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sundin13 4 days ago
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BFR said:
sundin13 said:

I am unfamiliar with any updated guidance stating that anything less than an N95 was ineffective (although efficacy does vary by fit and construction) or any guidance where they ever said that N95 masks were ineffective. 

I would love to see a source for these claims as when I search for the most up to date guidance from the CDC, I still see them providing information maintaining the same perspective on masks. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/14/health/cloth-masks-covid-cdc.html

The CDC Is Finally Acknowledging That N95 Respirators Work Better Than Cloth Masks

"The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), whose previous advice about face coverings as a safeguard against COVID-19 paid little attention to large differences in the effectiveness of different mask types, recently revised its guidance to acknowledge that N95 respirators work better than reusable cloth masks or disposable surgical masks. As with earlier changes in CDC guidance, it is not exactly clear why the agency waited so long to highlight useful information about COVID-19, although the spread of the highly transmissible omicron variant may have something to do with it."

https://reason.com/2022/01/19/the-cdc-is-finally-acknowledging-that-n95-respirators-work-better-than-cloth-masks/

Seems we've moved on quite quickly but I'd like to circle back to some of these claims. See, you made a claim and I asked you to provide evidence. Your evidence was then criticized quite thoroughly by pi-guy and then you moved on without ever concluding the discussion. I am of the mind that when having a conversation like this, it does a disservice to the conversational environment to move on before things are settled.

So, I would just like to ask: Do you acknowledge that you are wrong or that you don't have sufficient backing for the claims you are making, or do you have further evidence you would like to present?

Now, I'd like to summarize what I see as the discussions that have been had here just to be entirely clear about what I'd like you to respond to in reference to masks:

Claim 1: "When Covid was over, [the CDC] admitted that only wearing an N95 mask would protect you from it."

As seen in the post that you made above, the CDC did not say that "only wearing an N95 mask would protect you", but instead that there was different levels of efficacy in relation to different types of masks. Pivotally, "Mask B is not as effective as Mask A" is fundamentally different from "Mask B is not effective". 

Do you acknowledge that the CDC did not claim that "only wearing an N95 mask would protect you"?

Claim 2: "Cloth masks were essentially useless against Covid-19."

This one came a bit later, but I think it is quite an important one to circle back on. The first point I mentioned is in regards to the CDC's communication, however this one is more broadly about the efficacy of masks. You spoke about two studies here that I would like to highlight. 

The first is the study discussed by this NY Post article. As evidence by pi-guy's post, this study was methodologically flawed leading to the authors apologizing for the study.

The second is the study discussed in this National Library of Medicine article. This study argues the opposite of what you claim it does, and in fact supports the efficacy of cloth masks. 

Do you acknowledge that the provided studies do not provide ample evidence for the claim that cloth masks (or masks in general) were essentially useless against Covid-19?