There is yet no evidence that explicitly ties the use of a face mask to lower rates of SARS-CoV-2 transmission. A lot of the published evidence is either inconsistent, or indirect (measurement of droplets, but that doesn't take physical barriers like nose and mouth, or the viral load required to overcome the non adaptive immune system). In fact, it has been argued that non pharmacological interventions should be evaluated with better evidence [1].

A Danish clinical trial enrolling 3000 people will probably give some more concrete answers.

OTOH, hand washing and distance are definitely useful to reduce spread.

P.S. Feel free to state your disagreement explicitly instead of downvoting.

[1] https://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2020/08/28/margaret-mccartney-we-n...

Is there clinical evidence for handwashing and distancing is effective? Study with a nice chart saying the benefit for each additional foot?

Great explanation of the issues here: https://medium.com/incerto/the-masks-masquerade-7de897b517b7

I'm not saying that masks don't work. But whether they are effective at reducing transmission and, if so, in what measure are open questions. The literature is at this point inconclusive[1]. Even the latest Lancet paper on masks and distancing attracted some criticism[2].

Of course,I agree that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. But, as the BMJ post I quoted earlier says, instead of just saying "wear a mask", the best idea would also promote trials to verify their effectiveness (like the Danish trial). It's done all the time for drugs, why not masks?

[1] https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/masking-lack-of-evidence-with-...

[2] https://pubpeer.com/publications/6AF113CE946CABB0FBB811697E5...

This article is flawed in numerous ways.

"missing the compounding effect" - What about the compounding effect of numerous people putting a plague vector directly on their respiratory system?

"Mistaking Absence of Evidence for Evidence of Absence" - The argument isn't that because there's no evidence it's guaranteed to not work. The argument is that without solid evidence constitutional rights should not be infringed.

And on and on.

Hand washing won't help, we've always known this.

It will do something, in a very complicated way, but compared to things that really matter that we haven't been able to push like mask wearing(you disagree) and social distancing and being outside, hand washing has been a huge distraction, which is the same as saying it's helped increase the spread.

Please don't take HN threads further into flamewar. Posting like this is basically arson, or criminal negligence. I'm sure you don't mean to cause harm, but this has been a problem for a long time:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23730601

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23299305

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20135818

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18257769

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16055379

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15695133

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14540750

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13859103

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12995487

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12995486

If you can't or won't fix this, we're going to have to ban you. Most accounts would be banned by now after a lot less than that. Can you please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules from now on?

Thanks for your work keeping the site sane, Dang. Apologies. I get overly emotional.

That's just being human. We don't hold it against you at all.

It's America's obsession with self righteous indignation. "How dare you not go along with the mob and put on your mask. What kind of horrible person are you?" Americans, of which I am one, have this mentality that if someone disagrees, they are a terrible, horrible person that must be crushed by your rightness.

Yep. Completely agree. There's very little middle ground anymore. It's just pure righteous indignation from all sides.

Trump bad, guns good, abortion good, q anon good...and on and on.

I personally blame the media, where most people get their information, for presenting things in an extremely one sided non-nuanced manner, no matter, what party or group you hail from.

It makes it impossible to empathize with the other side or see other ideas if it's presented already by the media as unquestionable ideas.

However, it's also on the population for being intellectually lazy and not validating or verifying what they see on the news media.

I think parent’s point is that these measures are intended to stretch out the curve so the peak is lower (not overwhelming) but the area under the curve is the same (same total deaths). The hope is of course that a vaccine chops off its right tail.