
Reducing transmission of SARS-CoV-2 - sohkamyung
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/early/2020/05/27/science.abc6197
======
PeterStuer
The problem is the scientific community did not immediately denounce those
scientists that clearly were putting policy before science.

It wasn't just the masks saga. Anyone with basic comprehension of physics and
particle data can see how and why masks work, so Don't try to fool the public
by lying and don't sit by when some colleagues are basically destroying the
whole of the scientific community's credibility just to appease some political
interests.

Same for 'social distancing' in enclosed spaces. If you let that sort of
nonsense stand, how can you not realize you are just throwing the whole of the
scientific trust under the bus?

And now the latest one: 'Children do not transmit the virus' just because some
political parties want to reopen schools ASAP?

Just stick to the science, and leave the politics to the politicians.

As I said here back in March, the damage done to scientific credibility is the
most saddening collateral in all of this. There wil always be some persons
willing to do someone's dirty laundry for fame, gain or even just because they
genuinly believed it all 'white lies' for the best of intentions. The huge
failure of the scientific community was not calling them out.

~~~
shibeouya
What is your evidence that children actually do transmit the virus
efficiently?

I have seen multiple independent studies from different countries coming down
with a very similar conclusion that children are not good vectors for this
thing to spread.

~~~
rumanator
> What is your evidence that children actually do transmit the virus
> efficiently?

OP's point is about if children transmit the virus. Either they do or don't.

But your question is about the efficiency of how children transmit the virus.
It's an entirely different question although your personal choice of weasel
words makes it look differently.

It makes no sense to waste time talking about efficiency if you're talking
about a known virus transmission vector.

~~~
votepaunchy
By that measure masks do not work since N95 allows a certain level of
particles to transit. Perfection is not necessary, only reducing the
replication factor.

~~~
rumanator
> By that measure masks do not work

That's a stupid remark. N95 are used mainly to reduce the emission of our own
droplets, not to eliminate it nor to make us invulnerable.

Still, the recommended approach is still to stay at home and avoid contact
altogether. As it's obvious to anyone, no exposure is far better than some
exposure.

------
nsxwolf
How many steps of the scientific method should scientists need to get through
before they can make policy? Throughout this pandemic we've been getting
whipsawed by "science". Is a few months really enough time to do all the
science on a question as difficult as the efficacy of masks during a novel
virus pandemic?

~~~
disabled
Masks are prudent, considering that they are a very low risk and low cost
prevention intervention, irrespective of demonstrating efficacy.

True, it takes a long time (often very long) to establish factual information
that becomes widely accepted, but that is not the issue here. Also, the
scientific method and peer-review process cannot be altered, and these
processes (along with always following a strict code of ethics, staying
updated on ethical matters, never compromising on ethics, and never losing
sight of all of the above—ever) are even more important during a pandemic.
Implying that these processes should be altered is unethical and
unconscionable.

We have known that SARS-CoV-2 spreads via respiratory droplets, and that it
was, most likely, by far, the main mode of transmission (although that would
have needed to be demonstrated too, in a pandemic). Wearing a face mask to
capture some of those respiratory droplets (even 10%) would at least help, and
would not be insignificant if people are required to wear them in public.

We know that cloth masks capture more than that though.

Also, based on a case report, it is possible that up to 80% of COVID-19
infections are asymptomatic.

Considering that, and the fact that it is spread mainly by respiratory
droplets, it is prudent to require the public to wear at least cloth masks.

Czech Republic (along with Slovak Republic—Slovakia) required people to wear
face masks in public starting around March 13, and was one of the first
western countries to require this. They are now easing restrictions and are
doing well.

One of the countries I am sovereign to, Croatia, (US is the other one) has not
had any reported coronavirus infections for 3 days in a row. You know, a
former war-torn Yugoslav country, still feeling the after effects, with a
relatively high and rapidly accelerating quality of life, by western
standards.

Stuff like mask wearing is not rocket science.

------
dboreham
Finally. What was obvious from the Diamond Princess data months ago has been
acknowledged.

~~~
newacct583
Can you be more specific on what you think was going unacknowledged? The
abstract is just "wear masks and test like crazy". Which has been pretty much
universal consensus since March. There's a whole industry of amateur mask
makers on Etsy at this point.

~~~
coding123
Except that everyone stopped wearing masks about two weeks ago.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
For certain narrow classes of everyone.

------
SeanLuke
That is one of the stupidest graphics I have ever seen in an academic journal
article.

~~~
henriquez
> For society to resume, measures designed to reduce aerosol transmission must
> be implemented

This is an opinion piece disguised as science. It’s presumptuous of a science
writer to make determinations about whether and how society will be permitted
to resume.

If we want people to be perfectly safe we’d also ban fast food, meat, alcohol,
nicotine, driving and sex. But the goal of society is not to keep people 100%
safe. Why are we okay with having our liberties trampled over an illness that
the CDC estimates has a 0.26% death rate?

~~~
sacred_numbers
Because the death rate is way higher than 0.26%. If the CDC really thinks it's
that low for the general population then they are wrong. The general consensus
I have seen, based on antibody tests in New York, Italy, Sweden, and Spain
point to a death rate between 0.75% and 1.25% for most developed nations. For
less developed nations (which, to be fair, is most of the world) the death
rate will be lower because there are fewer old people. I agree that we don't
have to shut down everything, but everyone should be wearing masks as much as
possible in public. Public smoking is highly restricted, at least partially
because of the risks of secondhand smoke, and the risks of COVID-19 are way
higher than that. People can do what they want at home, but we have to share
public spaces. It's not right for someone else to make decisions that endanger
me and my family just because they don't care about the risk.

~~~
marcell
The CDC latest best estimate is 0.4% death rate from Covid. This compares to a
death rate from the flu of around 0.2%, also based on CDC estimates [1].

Every death is a tragedy, but we didn't do half-lockdowns for the flu before.
Why are we doing a full lockdown for something that is 2x the flu.

Antibody testing largely supports a 0.4% death rates conclusion, I've tracked
this data in a spreadsheet I made [2]. 0.4% is close to the mean and median of
the studies I recorded.

Edit: I know it's gauche to complain about downvotes, but this post is just
citing data to make a point. Even if you are worried about Covid, it seems
dishonest to downvote data.

[1] [https://www.wcnc.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/data-
cd...](https://www.wcnc.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/data-cdc-
estimates-covid-19-mortality-rate/275-fc43f37f-6764-45e3-b615-123459f0082b)

[2]
[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16onEUBWIV5IqN1RCvTla...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16onEUBWIV5IqN1RCvTlad1jnQZ9W7p_P_yS-0D6j1-8/edit#gid=0)

~~~
ido
I genuinely mean this with no disrespect but how knowledgeable are you about
this & if you aren't why do you think some data collecting from the internet &
"back of the envelope" spreadsheet-ing makes you able to reasonably question
world experts that dedicated their careers to virology and pandemics?

If you are a programmer how much would you appreciate a medical doctor with no
training or experience in software development questioning your technical
decisions about what to use when building a software service?

~~~
lambdaphagy
Probably because it's hard to trust public health experts in a crisis whose
very existence has already demonstrated a failure in their authority.

If I wanted to reduce the risk of acquiring or transmitting an airborne
infection back in February, I would wear a mask and avoid enclosed spaces
without waiting for CDC's permission. Indeed, I would ignore their advice to
the contrary, which stood until April (!)

It would be really nice if we could defer to competent technocratic experts,
but they earn their trust by having credible track records, not by collecting
credentials.

~~~
jakeogh
No thanks. The Hippocratic oath is meaningless unless the subject decides what
constutites a medical procedure.

The train to technocratic ditatorship is paved with... the great glucose
poisioning epidemic, loss of free speech, loss of self defense. Todays
conventional wisdom is often not looked on favorably in the future.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRnB9El_V5g](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRnB9El_V5g)

Are we going to wear masks for the rest of our lives (outside FFS)? Pandemics
are an authortarian dream. The ability to engineer pandemics will only expand.

A bit of scale: Consider how many children go missing in the US each year.

------
djsumdog
I can't really take anything seriously anymore:

> Aerosols can accumulate, remain infectious in indoor air for hours

I remember Michael Osterholm said CoV2 wasn't airborne, but respiratory, and
he made the distinction airborne viruses stay in the air for hours (like
Measles). "Aerosols" would indicate they mean respiratory but then they talk
about it sticking around for hours.

> silent shedders

We are told there are asymptomatic people who spread the illness, but there is
also tons of research to show they may not
([https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32405162/](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32405162/))
or that some of them weren't even asymptomatic; they had symptoms but no one
asked (can't find that link).

This whole pieces seems like a long article to say "wear a mask," but all of
us see people who wear a mask incorrectly or wear a cloth mask that isn't very
effective against viral matter
([https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-1342](https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-1342))
and most people don't wash them daily, so they can build up moisture and
bacteria ([https://publichealth.uic.edu/news-stories/commentary-
masks-f...](https://publichealth.uic.edu/news-stories/commentary-masks-for-
all-for-covid-19-not-based-on-sound-data/)). A lot of people treat them like a
fashion accessory or just a thing they have to do and hang them up when they
get home.

When states mandate masks, you're no longer asking people, and you brake the
social contract. A lot of people do it just so they aren't shamed. A lot of
people who don't wear masks do it as a political statement. When you boil it
down ... it's all either political or shame.

There is a lot of explicit social conditioning and behavior modification going
on here and it's sinister. I'm sick of pre-pubs that get contracted the
following week and everyone going into hyper panic mode always. There are tons
of secondary effects (people not going in for regular cancer screenings
([https://unherd.com/thepost/professor-karol-sikora-fear-is-
mo...](https://unherd.com/thepost/professor-karol-sikora-fear-is-more-
dangerous-than-the-virus/)), suicide attempts
([https://archive.vn/N18t9](https://archive.vn/N18t9)), heart conditions,
etc.) that will catch up with us.

I went into more detail earlier this month about getting fed up with our
terrible information situation. This is not a time of honor:

[https://battlepenguin.com/politics/this-is-not-a-time-of-
hon...](https://battlepenguin.com/politics/this-is-not-a-time-of-honor/)

~~~
timmytokyo
I don't think the primary motivation for wearing masks is to protect yourself
from others. It's to protect others from you. That's why there's shame
involved in not wearing one; if you don't wear it, you're advertising that you
don't care about the health of people around you. That's truly sinister.

Unfortunately, something as innocuous as mask wearing has been politicized in
the US by certain unsavory political and media figures. In more enlightened
countries and cultures (see most of Asia), wearing masks in the midst of a
pandemic is just common sense. America is broken.

~~~
0d9eooo
Unfortunately, I sympathize with the anti-mask requirement sentiment, even
though I wear one in indoor public spaces like grocers. I don't think people
should be shamed or that they should be mandated.

When I read into it it's not always clear masks work well to limit egress of
virus, and I do think the scientific community is to blame to some extent for
presenting things as "masks are scientific and lack of masks is not." This
approach might only worsen things relative to a message of "we don't really
know but it's a good idea to be prudent."

Linked scientific articles advocating masks I find are often misleading. They
often are based on _other_ viruses that potentially have other transmission
properties, or make questionable assumptions, like that the mask is an n95
mask or is wet cloth. When I have found actual studies of SARS-CoV-2 with dry
fabric of the sort most masks are made of, the masks work, but not nearly as
well as you might think.

The problems with masks have really been underscored for me practically too.
I've tried a couple of masks now, fit to my face, and I've run into a telling
problem: when I breathe in mildly colder air, my breath shoots out from
underneath my mask and fogs my glasses immensely. Not only is it evident in a
very visible way that when I'm wearing the mask it's not actually blocking
airflow very well, but then I have to constantly adjust things because I can't
see, and sometimes have to resort to removing the mask entirely.

I still wear the mask and the fogging has gotten better as it's warmed, but my
overall impression is that there are good reasons people might not wear masks,
and I think the evidence in favor of them is much weaker and less rigorous
than is often acknowledged. I think if the scientific community were being
honest, they'd say they don't work great, but it's something, and every bit
can count. That message seems to be enough; it would go a long way.

~~~
lutorm
* I think if the scientific community were being honest, they'd say they don't work great, but it's something, and every bit can count.

Funny, because that's exactly my impression of what they _are_ saying.

------
KCUOJJQJ
>Masks reduce airborne transmission.

Not as much as Ebola suits:
[https://www.welt.de/img/gesundheit/mobile130688133/039162761...](https://www.welt.de/img/gesundheit/mobile130688133/0391627617-ci23x11-w960/DWO-
WS-Ebola-Institut-Aufm-jpg.jpg)

1 Ebola suit for everyone, with an air supply rucksack.

~~~
rspicer
You try finding a PAPR in stock for sale to anyone who isn't a purchaser for a
medical provider or first responder agency right now..

True story: I almost bought a 3M PAPR last fall because I wanted it for a "The
Expanse" prop replica space suit I've been thinking about building. Decided
that a few hundred bucks was too much to spend for the look of something
alone, though. That would've been the best gratuitous purchase I ever made, in
hindsight. Of course I probably still wouldn't be able to get filters for the
thing, and properly caring for and disinfecting non-disposable hardware like
that is nontrivial...

