Cloth masks are worse and may increase the rate of infection.

[AnaadiNitya]

Carl Heneghan is a clinical epidemiologist with expertise in evidence-based medicine, research methods, and evidence synthesis.
He is Director of the NIHR SPCR Evidence Synthesis Working Group a collaboration of nine primary care departments across UK universities. He set up and directs the Oxford COVID Evidence Service, has over 400 peer-reviewed publications (current H Index 67); published 95 systematic reviews. He is Editor in Chief of BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine, and Editor of the Catalogue of Bias.

He recently attended an online
aCOVID 19 special response committee meeting. He is saying there is no evidence these masks work especially in the way we are being told to wear them.

Here is the video

He is also the man that forced the government to review the PHE failings

Why is it always a YouTube video?

@gamerchick

Why is it always a YouTube video?

Because it's one of the most well known video sharing sites?

@gamerchick

Why is it always a YouTube video?

Yeah id rather just read something

I havnt got the manuscript of it

@gamerchick

Why is it always a YouTube video?

You could have a look on his twitter account?

if it is only a single source of evidence (one video and the same speaker's twitter) then I'm going to be very sceptical.

So the issue is how we are told to wear them?

Oh ffs.

It's intolerable. Only yesterday I was reading about different mask effectiveness!
3 layer fabric were good apparently, surgery ones ok.
Scarf around face was a no no.

@AnaadiNitya

I havnt got the manuscript of it

I don’t see Why youve got the humphy face

At no point have i said I won’t watch it...just that i prefer reading

I.e how we wear cloth masks not the fact we are wearing cloth masks.

People need to be a bit more responsible when spreading things online

@NutellaFitzgerald

if it is only a single source of evidence (one video and the same speaker's twitter) then I'm going to be very sceptical.

Your sceptical of Carl Heneghan? Right ok. Did you actually read the OP of who he is and what he is doing? It’s not Dave from down the road doing YouTube videos in his shed.

Wear a mask.
Don't wear a mask.
Stay at home.
But go to work.

I GIVE UP 🤷‍♀️

@Iggly

I.e how we wear cloth masks not the fact we are wearing cloth masks.

People need to be a bit more responsible when spreading things online

Cloth masks do not work that’s why they are not allowed in health care settings. For proper masks to work 200,000 people would have to wear one continuously for a week to stop one person catching the virus

gamerchick snap. I find videos so annoying. Can you watch it for me and summarise? Pretty please?

Ah, youtube.

Found this on the BMJ. This is just a bit of it.

Main outcome measure Clinical respiratory illness (CRI), influenza-like illness (ILI) and laboratory-confirmed respiratory virus infection.

Results The rates of all infection outcomes were highest in the cloth mask arm, with the rate of ILI statistically significantly higher in the cloth mask arm (relative risk (RR)=13.00, 95% CI 1.69 to 100.07) compared with the medical mask arm. Cloth masks also had significantly higher rates of ILI compared with the control arm. An analysis by mask use showed ILI (RR=6.64, 95% CI 1.45 to 28.65) and laboratory-confirmed virus (RR=1.72, 95% CI 1.01 to 2.94) were significantly higher in the cloth masks group compared with the medical masks group. Penetration of cloth masks by particles was almost 97% and medical masks 44%.

Fabric masks are security theatre. Gives the public a visible indication that the government are DOING SOMETHING.

Avoiding contact with people outside of your household is still the best way to stop the spread. But there is a need to balance that against the need to have a functioning economy to pay for the NHS. So fabric masks it is!

Isn't this what we were told all along, until the government decided that actually, people wanted to be told to wear masks?

I wonder if people who wear cloth masks, which will be the general public, are more likely to put themselves in riskier situations than those who don’t. Which may well contribute to the spread.

I’ve seen mixed sources on this and I conclude that the evidence is not conclusive.

That seems to be about whether they protect the wearer, if everyone else is bare faced. Because cloth masks aren't great at stopping incoming droplets. Which is not what the mask wearing policy is about. The mask wearing policy is about having everyone wearing a mask so that they don't shed droplets in all directions. Which there's quite a lot of evidence for them working for.

with the rate of ILI statistically significantly higher in the cloth mask arm (relative risk (RR)=13.00, 95% CI 1.69 to 100.07) compared with the medical mask arm.

Does medical mask mean the disposable masks we can get in shops or does it mean a higher grade mask only available to hospitals/dentists etc?

@FinnyStory

Isn't this what we were told all along, until the government decided that actually, people wanted to be told to wear masks?

Yes. I agree.

I thought this was common sense? The government also give specific guidelines on handling masks cloth or otherwise which most people don’t do. I was in the queue at my local shop and a paramedic in front of my was rubbing her nose and messing with her mask whilst it was hanging off her ear. If those working at the nhs treat them like that then are they really any use?

@BF2748

I thought this was common sense? The government also give specific guidelines on handling masks cloth or otherwise which most people don’t do. I was in the queue at my local shop and a paramedic in front of my was rubbing her nose and messing with her mask whilst it was hanging off her ear. If those working at the nhs treat them like that then are they really any use?

Considering that 16,820 NHS staff are off sick or isolating due to COVID - that doesn’t surprise me