Again, your driving analogy is not equivalent because we do enforce safety measures on drivers.

We are in a global crisis. Expecting to be able to go on with life as usual without any regard for the consequences to others is absurd and selfish.

Hong Kong flu wasn't enough deaths either earlier, and it wasn't much different than covid as of now.

Vehicles didn't pop up everywhere all at once. They did spread, and have been for a century, yet we've only added safety measures to them over time, punished those who've broke laws, and have never restricted driving for everyone worldwide because of an increase in traffic deaths.

So how many deaths is too many when every last life matters? How long before something like covid becomes the norm and nobody cares anymore?

Life as usual didn't use to include vehicular travel, yet now it does, and we've just lived with the growing consequences like it's no big deal. Sounds kind of absurd and selfish to me. I wonder what the natives think?

As Torillian says, comparing motor travel to a pandemic is a stretch to begin with, but if we're just going to loosely compare them as things that can cause death, we enforce safety regulations on drivers to minimise said death toll. Mandating masks during a pandemic of an airborne virus is no different in this context to making people follow the speed limit. 

How effective is wearing a mask vs following the speed limit? Are we directly comparing or not? Those who don't follow their rules, mentioned prior, well.

I don't remember being against some reasonable masking rules, but I have pointed out why some won't bother following them and rightfully so based on how things have played out. That's not to say those individuals are right or wrong overall, but the blame mostly lies elsewhere.

If people won't do something as simple as wearing a mask to protect themselves and their community I'd hardly call that "rightfully so".

I don't honestly remember anyone other than the orange dipshit saying "even a single life lost to coronavirus is too much". That's just what he says when he wants to distract from the fact 300,000 died under his watch. I'm more in the camp that we do the restrictions that are recommended by the experts to try and limit it so 300,000 aren't 600,000. 

I'll put the question back to you, how many people would have to die before coronavirus is something that is worth quarantining for? 

When their professional leadership tells them masking is not necessary or they're told by other (trusted) professionals it could cause some level of harm to themselves, or that the effectiveness is questionable if not quite low, what are people supposed to think? Even the highest establishments have changed their recommendations over time and not minimal changes either. You can't tell the people you're the honest trusted experts, then constantly change your rules, especially when those individuals are caught breaking the rules themselves. For those who talk about setting an example and how much it means, it seems many of them don't seem to think that matters in this situation. Just because a professional may look the part and have the certificates, don't mean much to some people. Their actions are what speak.

Beyond that is the media. Putting someone like Bill Gates on there is idiotic. Whether you think he's smart or not, he's not seen as a medical professional, so why is he being broadcast when it comes to covid? Or when riots break out, and the news says nothing of it being a problem as per the pandemic, which they've focused on heavily for months, but instead fuel it? Then having 'experts' on who say a vaccine will take until later 2021 or even 2022 to become available and there being no chance it could be ready this year, only for it to be available now.

All this and more is reason enough not to listen for some. Those who agree that, "with great power come great responsibility", should also agree the people in charge have done a terrible job all around. The medical staff and people have been done a great disservice.

The quality of leadership has varied by country, and what we know about the disease has changed as we've learned more about it, but it's the scientific consensus that masks are beneficial, and it has been for some time now.

Trump did say it, because some of the Dems and media were saying it and it was being used against him as if he didn't care because he wasn't saying it. Usually he goes against their slogan's, but because it's true and he also agrees it made sense to use it.

Can't honestly answer that because I don't trust the numbers. When it's been shown that this year the total deaths are in line with what's been normal for the last decade, even though it should be much higher because of covid, I can't help but wonder. Especially when it get's blocked and taken down soon after.

Things like the amount of cold and flu deaths being lower, which isn't a surprise, because if covid is worse then odds are high that some of those people are going to die from covid instead. In which case, if statistically a certain amount in general die every year from the cold and flu, and some of them died of covid instead, why is that being added to the death count, or blamed on anyone else? If they were unfortunately going to pass from one of those illnesses, due to underlying conditions or whatever, why is that someone else's fault? We never say anything about it otherwise.

I will say it's not just about how many. Who matters just as much. There are certain age ranges that are more important to keep healthy in a more hostile outbreak. Gender would also come into play if that ever was a target and the illness was bad enough.