We've been over this 100 times: very few people can wear an n95 mask correctly. Men have to be clean shaven too, and you're supposed to perform a seal test using a mint spray. They're also supposed to be one time use.

Masks of secondary effects: a global waste problem. It's time to stop promoting these as a "solution" to a non-existant problem.

And the flip side: N95 masks don't need to be worn correctly to be effective for preventing most Covid spread. Covid seems to require moderate viral loads to spread, and even an incorrectly-worn N95 mask tends to do that.

And with proper care, N95 masks can be reused.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/can-you-reuse-a-kn...

The clean shaven part isn't true any more. There's a reason first responders are no longer required to be clean cut.

>It's time to stop promoting these as a "solution" to a non-existant problem.

What do you mean by non existent problem?

Non-existant?

This is not stupid. The reporting is stupid. The way science here works:

Step 1: People come up with a hundred hypotheses

Step 2: Six of them are confirmed in preliminary studies, five by fluke (false positives) and one true positive

Step 3: The one true positive is confirmed in multiple replication studies

Step 3 is when we get to a reasonable scientific theory or scientific fact.

The problem is step 1.5 or 2.5: Popular press picks up a hypothesis as "science" or (at 2.5) as peer-reviewed science, often promoted by the original researcher.

We absolutely should be investigating heparin, ivermectin, vitamin D, zinc, and other speculative drugs for effects. Outside of exceptional circumstances, we absolutely should not be recommending those for general use until they're validated.

As a footnote, machine learning supercharges this process. It can generate countless speculative drugs very rapidly. The vast majority are nonsense, but the tiny minority which work make it still worthwhile. If we have a something with a 1% chance of curing a disease, it takes, on average, 100 similar trials to cure that disease. For major diseases, that (or even much longer-shot cures) is completely worth it.

> As a footnote, machine learning supercharges this process. It can generate countless speculative drugs very rapidly. The vast majority are nonsense, but the tiny minority which work make it still worthwhile.

Is this actually happening right now or are we just creating a speculative future for ourselves. Who is running the sanity checks on these huge number of potential medications to make sure the drugs aren't obviously poisonous?

Yes. This is happening. Ultimately, drugs created this way go through the same checks as any other drug. Most drugs, created this way or otherwise, don't work and are potentially poisonous. That's why the processes here are super-rigorous.