As a counterexample: New Zealand, minimal infections and deaths, and minimal mask wearing. https://www.health.govt.nz/our-work/diseases-and-conditions/...

"Healthy people in the community are not currently required to wear a face mask for protection from COVID-19 in New Zealand. In our current environment, the potential benefits of requiring masks to be worn by all healthy people in the community are not felt to outweigh the potential risks."

Yes, because New Zealand has such a low transmission rate they can carefully track and isolate new cases. Because there's such a low rate, they don't need masks.

When it's everywhere, like in the US, we don't have that option. Masks are one of few mitigations available to us.

Seriously? This is because they DID wear masks and comply with lockdowns and quarantine — to the point of getting rid of Covid.

The US can’t even get past square one.

Because nobody's coming in, at all.

What's the average population density in NZ vs all those other places? Anecdotally I'd say a small fraction.

Americans aren’t that divided about masks. I’ve driven around the country quite a bit during this. Most people do not have a problem with masks.

Don’t believe the hype.

The majority of people Just go along with whatever. Most people are receptive to masks. There’s a tiny vocal minority that are against them.

I've had to road trip a lot as well, and my experience was different. There were a lot of people who don't wear masks.

I'm in the same boat - Been in SEA for a number of years. All the locals wear masks and there's no issue. The foreigners are the ones pushing against it.

> I don’t have COVID-19

You can't know this with certainty at any given time unless you've been rigorous in avoiding social contact and other exposure, and at worst the mask accomplishes nothing but does no harm (in the vast majority of cases), so there's no reason to _not_ wear a mask.

> There’s no evidence that supports the idea of asymptotic spread

"Asymptomatic transmission (i.e. when the infector has no symptoms throughout the course of the disease), is difficult to quantify. [...] Pre-symptomatic transmission (i.e. when the infector develops symptoms after transmitting the virus to another person) has been reported. Exposure of secondary cases occurred 1–3 days before the source patient developed symptoms." https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/covid-19/latest-evidence/trans...

"The extent of truly asymptomatic infection in the community remains unknown. [...] Multiple studies have shown that people infect others before they themselves became ill, which is supported by available viral shedding data" https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/transmissi...

Even if you ignore all the evidence that there is asymptomatic spread, wearing a mask does provide you some protection from others. And indicates that you place some value on others’ safety.

But clearly at this point science and evidence have become matters of personal belief and convenience, which is quite unfortunate.

The current evidence points to asymptomatic transmission being much less likely than symptomatic transmission. This =/= no evidence that supports asymptotic spread.

And that’s ignoring that there are separate studies that think the chance of asymptomatic transmission is much higher, and studies that estimate the majority of transmission is caused by asymptomatic cases. Given the cost of wearing a mask is low and the price of being wrong about the evidence is high, there remains no good reason not to wear a mask.

I consider myself fairly hygenic and don't think I have any diseases, and don't really think we should be concerned about clouds of particulate spittle - so what difference is a little quantity?

If I want to spit on the restaurant or train floor, I darn well will! What difference does it make?

I'm walking around minding my own business, not spitting on people. People who wear their masks while riding a bicycle or walking down the street are making decisions based on what a biased media has told them, not science or data.

Which is why I chose two private domains in my examples - a consumer retail environment and public transport, both of which were subject to a change in culture 100-odd years ago, wherein prior boors wouldn't have even questioned spitting on the floor.

'Clearly that is rude' to a modern audience.

I don't disagree with your views on people wearing masks when there's no one about, or they're in a car or on a bike, etc, but you didn't make a distinction initially between that and places where it's reasonable to expect people should 'just shut up and put a mask on'.

It's never a reasonable position that someone should "shut up and do what I say". So many pro-science and rational thinkers have let fear totally consume them. I'm not sure why. The death rate for COVID-19 is less than 1% of infected.

It's more 'stop being a prick and be polite'. Society is a series of rules, stated or otherwise, that the generality gravitate around. It's not rocket science, it's just manners.

One has every right not to wear a mask, just as a business owner has every right to deny someone access to their facilities.

Masks are irritating, but the sheer histrionics that they are causing in some quarters is ludicrous and is clearly more 'anti-science' (if that's really your criticism here) than the masked contingent is.

Asymptotic is a different classification than presymptomatic. Both occurred and “Both are difficult to stop. Presymptomatic spread is believed to be far more common than asymptomatic spread.” https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20200609/who-clairifies-comm...

Critically, you don’t know the future and have no idea if your presymtomatic or not. It’s only relent for contract tracing not masks.

I think the problem is driven by laziness. People just can't be bothered. But they identify as "hard working" and need to provide some kind of post hoc justification. And the current mess of identity politics provides an oven ready excuse for every situation.