To ask about the inequalities and economics of face masks?

[Pepperwort]

This is now an extra compulsory expense of life at a time of economic issues for many. I’m wondering how easily most / all people can add this to their bills.

There are also luxury varieties appearing on the market offering increased protection, despite the lack of research on them so far, which conceivably might reduce chances of catching it. I’m wondering about both elements.

**make

@Chloemol
It is not nice to call people idiots if you disagree with their point if view.
The infection rate is rising because testing is rising. It doesn't actually mean people get I'll with Covid19.
There are many false positive results.
Also PCR tests are not accurate.

bpa-pathology.com/covid19-pcr-tests-are-scientifically-meaningless/

The government have done a good job brainwashing people into believing everything they say.
Many people on Mumsnet have lost the ability to question and think critically.

While MN can be an echo chamber as much as other websites and the science is emerging Lunar you might want to look at that article I linked and see how carefully the biases of individual studies are calculated and weighed. There’s always more to know but outright mistakes (like mine) aren’t helpful and some logic errors are easy to spot.

RaspberryToupee’s seemed a good summary. The attitude chucked around in Britain gets irritating.

I bought a plastic visor from Home Bargains because I find masks stuffy and uncomfortable. I rarely go in shops etc anyway (this week was my second time out in 5 months).

Are visors considered as effective as face masks and fabric coverings at protecting other people? I wouldn't want to put anyone at risk so if not I just wouldn't go out again, I really can't stand wearing a mask.

I have eco anxiety and seeing the overflowing bins of single use masks and plastic gloves distressed me. Awful waste.

(meaning the attitude from rich advantaged typically Tory groups towards those HelenaDove was talking about).

My sons travel by public transport to secondary. They still lose quite a bit of kit so expect we will get through quite a few masks.

I wore a scarf the other day but felt like I was being judged for not wearing a surgical mask.

The thick reusable cloth masksmake my glasses steam up worse than the thin disposable ones.

*hammeringinmyhead

Meant to say I could probably cobble together 1 or 2 from old clothes, but not 8!

But why not? If you can make 1 you can male 8*

Can I? Do you know that I have enough old t shirts to make 8 lots of 50cm x 50cm fabric squares and that I have 16 spare hair ties?

Right now, this minute, I do not have the raw materials.

@Lunar567 - Many people on Mumsnet have lost the ability to question and think critically.

You're not exactly exhibiting an ability to question and think critically given you completely misinterpreted the BMJ article, believed the nonsense from The Freedom Journal, which basically pedals conspiracy theories and take a blog from Medium.com as gospel.

One of the great inequalities of COVID is its disproportionate impact (in terms of health and job security) on the less well off sections of society. So yes we should all wear masks and undertake the other actions asked of us (eg social distancing etc) to protect them.

Mask use having some effect literally does not need evidence

Everyone accepts that standing further away from people decreases your chance of infection because it's fucking obvious. Stand far enough away from everyone all of the time and you're not getting covid

But the 2m thing is totally arbitrary and has probably as little scientific evidence as masks do.

Logically, if you put a physical barrier between you and things then you get less things contacting you.

Everyone's like yeah but you're covered in virus and you'll get infected from your mask, I think if you're that covered in virus you're getting it anyway?

People that stand 'in principle' against masks are straight up 60%ers and probably doing us all a favour in the long run

@OchonAgusOchonO

Interestingly, some conspiracy theories turned out to be true.

And you believe everything the government have told us?

PHE have already admitted to inflating numbers if deaths with Covid.
They have also admitted that they ordered to send old people to care homes without testing and pressured care home to take ill people.
The government also admitted that they only adviced schools to close rather than ordered them.
They also admitted that they don't follow science on introducing masks.
The government have lost all credibility but people like you keep pushing their propaganda on Mumsnet.

@Lunar567 - Interestingly, some conspiracy theories turned out to be true.

And even more interestingly, the vast majority turn out to be nonsense.

And you believe everything the government have told us?

Of course not. But equally I don't automatically disbelieve everything they say. I examine the evidence and draw my own conclusions.

The government have lost all credibility but people like you keep pushing their propaganda on Mumsnet.

Given that I am not British and I don't live in the UK, I am definitely not peddling your government's propaganda. Most of us in the rest of the world have looked on in horror at the handling of covid (and brexit which everyone seems to have forgotten) by the UK. The cavalier treatment of your citizens by the government is nothing short of shocking. Johnson is an incompetent buffoon and if he told me the sky was blue, I would need evidence to support that, as I struggle to believe a word he says.

Lunar if you can identify bmj sources and correct info why waste your time on the rest.

I haven’t forgotten Brexit (holds head in hands).

@Pepperwort - Lunar if you can identify bmj sources and correct info why waste your time on the rest.

Unfortunately, identifying BMJ sources isn't enough if he/she then goes on to completely misinterpret and misrepresent the findings.

@Lunar567

The infection rate is rising because testing numbers is rising

I simply don’t understand your logic here. People are getting covid, the infection rate would be rising even if testing was not done. They would then carry on as normal, like you ignoring all rules, because they know best, and carry on passing it around,

By testing you then have data to work on, you can understand where the infections are, put in place local lockdowns etc and help contain it

As to calling you an idiot and you saying it’s not nice, I don’t care, your attitude is one of total irresponsibility

@Chloemol and everyone else
Please, read the latest update on Covid19

swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/

Please, stop living in fear

"Based on its largely conspiratorial contents and its cherry picking of questionable scientific studies, it has been categorised by some as an anti-establishment propaganda site."

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_Propaganda_Research

From here? Nah.

@Lunar567

Where have I said I am living in fear?

And actually I have more trust in Whitty and his crew than some Swiss paper

Indeed there will be people living so hand-to-mouth they can't afford a face covering. But hopefully not many. I think the greater problem will be for people with disrupted lives or health problems (including those drug and alcohol problems).

In general the reality is Covid-19, the government's response, and the oncoming recession are going to shit on the poor. Well-off people, except for those directly sickened, will be much less hurt.

@hammeringinmyhead - Based on its largely conspiratorial contents and its cherry picking of questionable scientific studies, it has been categorised by some as an anti-establishment propaganda site.

You beat me too it

@Porcupineinwaiting

One of the great inequalities of COVID is its disproportionate impact (in terms of health and job security) on the less well off sections of society. So yes we should all wear masks and undertake the other actions asked of us (eg social distancing etc) to protect them.

This.

Yes masks are expensive. I just moved back to the U.K. from Asia where masks are cheap, plentiful, and the government mails them to all households free of charge. I am shocked at the number of people here walking around (my reasonably affluent) town without masks. Why???

I completely agree that masks are expensive here, and overpriced, especially for people living in poverty. Mask poverty is real. But denying the efficiency of masks is not the solution.

Promoting conspiracy theories is not going to shorten the pandemic, it’s going to make it longer and more expensive, not to mention the loss of lives.

I have worn face masks (surgical fluid resistant) along with face visor, as a health care professional, for the last 20yrs. Firstly we wear them to prevent blood splatter and any other large droplets of body fluids entering our mouths and noses. Secondly they are great if the patient has body odour, bad breath or has eaten garlic.
They have never been great at preventing us catching colds or other viral infections.
If I cough or sneeze I will always turn my head away from patient since droplets and aerosol still pass through.
We change masks after each procedure and we learn not to touch the mask while it’s on our face.
Covid has actually meant we now wear full respirators so are fully protected, well 99.8% protected.
MASKS DO NOT PROTECT THE WEARER THEY ARE JUST A HANDKERCHIEF FIXED TO YOUR FACE SO IF YOU COUGH OR SNEEZE YOU DON’T PASS ON ANY POTENTIAL INFECTION VIA YOUR HANDS.

Infection control starts and finishes with hand washing and social distancing. Masks just stop us touching our noses and mouths where the virus is living and passing it on to other people.

Masks are not going to be our saviour.

Far East countries wear them because their air quality is so poor. They protect against smog. Google smog and look at how many people died every year in this country due to smog related diseases before the clean air act was introduced.

Masks save lives and reusable masks cost very little.

@Lunar567, the most recent thing you posted:
evidencenotfear.com/masks-dont-work-a-review-of-science-relevant-to-covid-19-social-policy-researchgate/
has been taken down from both the places it appeared, no doubt for being more of the conspiracy theory stuff you've referenced before. Maybe this has run its course for you now, because it doesn't feel like any of the comments have induced you to rethink your position. Sorry about that.

@MedSchoolRat While you yourself might not have heard of the precautionary principle since 2001 and your negative encounter with an American policy maker, given your username, perhaps you'll also understand you're conflating absence of evidence and evidence of absence by assuming your own lack of knowledge means it's not widely known and accepted in some areas of medicine? A simple search of any of the medpub databases shows that's not the case: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4935673/

I think Trish Greenhalgh was making the points the way she did in part because of the tendency of anti-maskers to say there is no point wearing them because there are no controlled (ie comparison group) studies of masks vs non-masks. One of her points is that it is not ethical or necessary to use control group studies as the only scientific justification for masks. Greenhalgh is an experienced researcher and medic with an very strong google scholar profile and the profile of the guy you linked to doesn't match up to hers at all:
scholar.google.com/citations?user=yQbqigMAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao
vs
scholar.google.com/citations?user=8KQwEGcAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao

Or to save you clicking, there are 61,000+ citations to her work vs 900+ for his and other measures suggest her work is much more impactful than his also.

In the rare occasion/field where a woman is one of the established experts, isn't it a good thing, on mumsnet, for us not to promote/advertise the sometimes shouty men who talk over women, or even polite men (I'm not on twitter so I don't know about him other than the couple of "I know best about stats" tweets I just read below the one you linked), without at least pointing out the disparity in scientific achievements and recognizing scientific achievement and expert status? I don't mean renowned scientists shouldn't ever be challenged, but come on with linking to tweets/opinions, not studies.

Anyway, back to the topic of the thread, the overwhelming preponderance of evidence, opinion and common sense suggests masks, amongst other measures, are sensible precautions to take and the wisdom of mumsnet on this thread has shown the OP's question was one worth debating. I

'm not sure we've got to the heart of OPs question, which is, I think, that some can afford N-95s, some can afford healthcare standard visors too, and others have to make their own masks from socks, and is this equality?

The medical research on N-95 level masks, even in non-medical settings vs surgical/cloth etc might be looked at... Is this inequality? In my opinion, yes. There is also the issue of valved masks...

Me, I'm holding out for a vaccine.

[quote Lunar567]@Chloemol
It is not nice to call people idiots if you disagree with their point if view.
The infection rate is rising because testing is rising. It doesn't actually mean people get I'll with Covid19.
There are many false positive results.
Also PCR tests are not accurate.

bpa-pathology.com/covid19-pcr-tests-are-scientifically-meaningless/

The government have done a good job brainwashing people into believing everything they say.
Many people on Mumsnet have lost the ability to question and think critically.[/quote]
Yes they have!

Try looking in the mirror.

Masks HELP to protect others. Do your bit & stop whinging & coming out with nonsense.