Assuming that they’re accurate, what can you conclude from the charts presented here at Rational Ground?
- Masks don’t work to reduce the spread of SARS-CoV-2.
- They might work but mandates to wear masks are violated too routinely.
- Lockdowns don’t work to reduce the spread of SARS-CoV-2.
- Lockdowns might work but they were applied so haphazardly they were probably mostly useless.
- Not much.
Just for the record my own view is closest to E. The real world is messy and there are too many things happening all at the same time to draw conclusions about what measures intended to slow the spread of SARS-CoV-2 worked or how well. All of the measures proposed (masks indoors, masks outdoors, lockdowns, social distancing) probably would work in theory to some degree but cost-benefit analysis should be applied. Wearing masks indoors—in stores, public transportation, etc.—passes cost-benefit analysis. Wearing masks out-of-doors except, possibly, on crowded city sidewalks, fails cost-benefit analysis due to moral hazard. Social distancing of 10 meters fails cost-benefit analysis. Social distancing of one meter probably passes cost-benefit analysis. I’m not sure we know enough to conclude whether social distancing of two meters passes or fails cost-benefit analysis. I think that significantly more restrictive lockdowns of, say, three weeks or even six weeks duration could have been justified if the time had been used to ensure that the health care system were not overwhelmed. That would have probably required more coordination among federal, state, and local governments than was possible. I’m skeptical that the much longer but much less restrictive lockdowns that were actually applied accomplished much of anything other than driving thousands or even hundreds of thousands of businesses into bankcuptcy and throwing millions of people out of work.
Interesting site.
Many of the graphs seem to support the contention that various mandates lagged behavioral changes that had already taken place by the public. That would necessarily mean that the effects of the mandates could be small to unmeasurable, especially considering the likelihood of diminishing returns as compliance grows.
For example (I’m making up numbers here for illustration), we may have achieved 90% of what widespread mask-wearing might achieve when 50% of people are regularly wearing masks. A mandate that comes into force at 60% compliance and pushes the compliance rate to 80% might not produce statistically significant effects, particularly when the new case rate is small compared to the total population.
And we still don’t seem to have good data on the mechanism and means that this disease is spreading, except by media anecdote. So here in Colorado we’ve had about 4000 new cases in the past week. Is there a pattern in those cases that would identify measures that individuals or government might take? We don’t know, they are just numbers, and that’s a problem when evaluating policy effects.
Well of course “E” is correct. A complete, theoretical, lockdown would work by definition. But since it is completely unachievable its silly on its face. Do I really need to go through the reasons? Dave hit some key issues.
As for masks, the evidence is all over the place. For the chuckle factor, the CDC warned that masks couldn’t protect against smoke particles……………which are far larger than viruses. Perhaps masks can prevent rank dispersion of spittle. But again, some of these masks are just a joke. Its really hit and miss at best.
This is all Keystone Cops, as government usually is. The virus is going to spread. It just is. You can delay, but you can’t hide. Protect the elderly and comorbid until treatment protocols are better, or a vaccine is available. Otherwise, its called life.
I took a drive this afternoon. My god, I could have been killed……….
I am somewhat a mask skeptic in the sense that I think there are trade-offs in which people will feel safer in circumstances with a mask than they should and given that masks are not 100% effective and vary in quality and wear, some people will get infected that would not have had masks not existed in the first place (that is, they would have avoided crowded, enclosed noisy places at the start).
I think avoidance is the first order precaution, masks are secondary. But everybody treats mask as something far too important, either as a force field that protects the righteous or a symbol of enslavement.
Clearly a site dedicated to “proving” that Covid is a hoax and just like the flu so I am guessing they have cherry picked their best possible cases. (IOW, this doesnt look like an objective, data based site.) That said, I think Andy touched on it. If you want to know if masks have a positive effect you dont look at the mandate you look at when people actually used them, how often they were used and where. For example, I dont think there is much evidence for wearing them outside unless you are really packed in tight, like at that Italian soccer game. On lockdowns people always forget that there is a delay in their effect. It looks to me like on some of these charts they “forgot” to mention when the lockdowns started lifting.
So in general, lockdowns had a pretty positive effect, even when not complete. Masks are harder to sort out since there are always other things going on. A really, really stupid disingenuous way to determine if they work is to look at mandate dates.
Think PD is mostly correct. Distancing is probably better. Just speaking as someone in the trade who has been reading this stuff for years, I dont see them as a force field but a fairly effective tool that can significantly reduce risk, meaning more than 25%.
Steve
Steve
PD,
That is the most insightful comment about masks I’ve read in a very long time.