I will concede that there has been no peer reviewed study that explicitly tries to identity an association between mask wearing and mental health. Thus, no impact has been measured. It was not for lack of trying to find a study though. There are literally no good studies (from my cursory google scholar peek) that opined one way or the other.
> There is no evidence that a child wearing a mask causes depression or anxiety
But, saying this is not correct either. [1]
> transmission of the coronavirus is less than 1%.
These studies are strongly confounded with city policy, distancing measures, individual measures and odds of being vaccinated. It is really difficult to get exclusive numbers for mask efficacy using observational or questionnaire based studies of any kind.
As for my second claim, please evaluate it in context. Public spaces is usually taken to mean outdoor spaces or high ventilation large indoor spaces. My comments are also in time where covid's fatality has collapsed and hospitals aren't overwhelmed.
Almost every mask study I read makes assumptions of ideal wearing patterns that do not seem to be match real world observations. Even then, they project modest gains when using the most common forms of cloth masks in perfectly covid-favored situations. Vaccines can't ensure zero-covid. Masks can't ensure zero-covid. The end game is that it can become endemic or we wear masks forever.
Masks are 'useless' in the same way that seat-belts in school buses are useless. The risks for the concerned demographic are orders of magnitude lower. The ideal testing scenario is impossible to recreate in practice. It is impossible to enforce compliance. It has knock-on effects that no one seems keen to study. And lastly, if draconian measure are to be used, there are alternatives with greater effectiveness and lower social cost can should be tried first.
I will concede that there has been no peer reviewed study that explicitly tries to identity an association between mask wearing and mental health. Thus, no impact has been measured. It was not for lack of trying to find a study though. There are literally no good studies (from my cursory google scholar peek) that opined one way or the other.
> There is no evidence that a child wearing a mask causes depression or anxiety
But, saying this is not correct either. [1]
> transmission of the coronavirus is less than 1%.
These studies are strongly confounded with city policy, distancing measures, individual measures and odds of being vaccinated. It is really difficult to get exclusive numbers for mask efficacy using observational or questionnaire based studies of any kind.
As for my second claim, please evaluate it in context. Public spaces is usually taken to mean outdoor spaces or high ventilation large indoor spaces. My comments are also in time where covid's fatality has collapsed and hospitals aren't overwhelmed.
Almost every mask study I read makes assumptions of ideal wearing patterns that do not seem to be match real world observations. Even then, they project modest gains when using the most common forms of cloth masks in perfectly covid-favored situations. Vaccines can't ensure zero-covid. Masks can't ensure zero-covid. The end game is that it can become endemic or we wear masks forever.
Masks are 'useless' in the same way that seat-belts in school buses are useless. The risks for the concerned demographic are orders of magnitude lower. The ideal testing scenario is impossible to recreate in practice. It is impossible to enforce compliance. It has knock-on effects that no one seems keen to study. And lastly, if draconian measure are to be used, there are alternatives with greater effectiveness and lower social cost can should be tried first.
[1] https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/the-phrase-no-evidence...