Thoughts on using facemasks again....as numbers rise

[Kcc73]

So....numbers of covid (along side other cold/flu viruses) and rising quickly.
I have had cold/sore throat/feeling fatigue - but not covid - after 7 days still can't shake it off. I am not that 'ill' and just getting on with what I have to do BUT my health generally not great and a) the thought of getting covid /or/and flu , plus all these more minor colds , and b) probably worse - the thought of my hubby or teens getting covid/flu (and they probably less careful/mindful re washing hands etc) and the impact of that alone! is beginning to get me in a spin (I suffer with chronic condition that doesn't make me cev but I have high fatigue and pains at best of times).

Yes, I do suffer with anxiety (but have reasons to justify) but as it becoming more evident that we heading into another wave, what is reasonable to do , looking at the measures we used in past - when it was kind of mandatory - that can do now?? I want , and have started wearing face mask in supermarkets . I want to ask my teens to wear facemask on public transport but because no one else, well few, are doing this, feel I can't impose this and don't want to pass on anxieties to them.

BUT I know as 'mum', that if (when) family get sick, it will fall to me to a lot more , which don't get me wrong, I do want and feel should do, - but my stance is let's try and do whatever we can to reduce likelihood or getting sick - or preparing for the worst. I am NOT going to be stopping life; but as we head into winter again I am getting worried. Hubby away for weekend with friends and now it's back to thinking 'oh expect he will bring back covid '.

So wish really there were some more mandatory mitigations tbh. I know a lot will shout me down about this. I don't think we should lockdown before anyone thinks then. Just we are a culture of 'followers' and when fold started wearing masks, it made others accept wearing ok, and when it no longer mandatory, if still wearing one you felt odd! Wondered if others starting to wear masks again or doing anything else? (apart from get vaccinated which for most won't be for a while; my appointment is late Oct as I have another health condition).

Long woffly message. Sorry!

Kc

Why do you think Scotland fared as they did?

I have seen a slight increase in mask wearing. I think I will start wearing one in shops and trains again. It might stop me getting flu even if my luck eventually runs out and I get covid regardless.

Even though mandatory masks mean many workplaces, particularly hospitality/entertainment venues, cannot function? What would you say to people whose workplaces would have to close, with no furlough scheme in place, during a cost of living crisis?

Evushield, definitely. I'm CEV and I would welcome this wholeheartedly.

Masks on PT aren't going to do much when schools, retail, offices etc aren't enforcing them. But when masks become mandatory, whole industries cannot operate. In the run up to Christmas with no furlough and a cost of living crisis that simply isn't feasible.

You're assuming that nearly every single person infected on public transport would be infected another way in the same time frame, even if that infection on the bus was prevented. I'm not sure that's a safe assumption. Maybe they would be infected at some point in another location, but that might not be the same week. Maybe their next infection will be delayed because their public transport journeys had fewer infection opportunities. That means a delay to when all the people that they might infect themselves get covid too.

Honestly given the pressures the NHS is under, I find it hard to see why reducing infections even a small amount isn't worth doing, where a particular precaution don't stop businesses operating.

I wore one on the bus today, packed shoulder to shoulder, half of them coughing. I was looked at like I was the idiot.

My daughter has covid, we spent the weekend together before I knew, so I wore a mask to protect others just in case. Probably shouldn't have bothered.

Honestly given the pressures the NHS is under, I find it hard to see why reducing infections even a small amount isn't worth doing, where a particular precaution don't stop businesses operating

But that's not what the OP and some PPs are asking, though. They're advocating the return of mandatory mitigations, including masks. That's the issue here. People wearing masks from personal choice isn't, there's no issue there at all. And mandatory masks will impact livelihoods.

Surely it depends where they're mandatory though? The op actually only mentions supermarkets and public transport.

If Germany can mandate good quality masks on public transport, I don't see why we couldn't at least try. I know why the current government won't want us to, but that's a separate question.

You did a good thing. People who wouldn't give you funny looks will have been sitting in that bus today, as well as the eye rollers.

So, masks for PT, but when you get where you're going - busy office, packed shops (working or shopping), gigs, school, etc - no masks required? What good would that do? It reminds me of those ridiculous rules last year where if you were at, say, a pub, you had to wear a mask to go to the bar or toilet but could take it off when you sat down, even if there was someone you didn't know sitting literally centimetres away from you and it was rammed. As if covid only knew to attack when people were standing up.

Lots of people have no option but to use public transport, so yes, that would be a good start. That may be one of their biggest daily risk areas.

Surely it depends where they're mandatory though? The op actually only mentions supermarkets and public transport.
If Germany can mandate good quality masks on public transport, I don't see why we couldn't at least try. I know why the current government won't want us to, but that's a separate question.

Because there's no evidence that this rule would actually reduce infections and some of you just wanting to give it a go is not a reason to inconvenience millions of people.

Because there would be a cost to having it, in the form of harassment of people who are exempt and of any financial cost if supermarkets and public transport authorities made any attempt to enforce it. Although tbf they wouldn't, we had supermarkets last time basically saying fuck that, not our job.

Because people who don't want to observe it won't, I for one will be opting out, and having laws the government visibly can't enforce is a bad thing in itself.

You're assuming that everyone on a bus is going to those places too. They're not all doing that. And even if they are all going to some of those places, not many people will be going to all of them.

Good masks on public transport would reduce (not eliminate, I know) the cross-transmission between the people going to office A and the people going to office B, or between the people going to hospital appointments and the people going to a nearby supermarket. They could all be on the bus at the same time, but spend the rest of the day not encountering each other at all. That means it's still worth them trying not to infect each other on the bus.

(Obviously the bus isn't the only place people from those places could meet, but it's a really significant one because of poor ventilation and lots of people being crammed in together.)

I just don't buy the idea that there's no point at all trying to reduce transmission anywhere, because we can't reduce it to zero. Covid is just that bit too nasty for it to seem a good idea to give up to that extent.

Oh, I also missed a bit- the 'good quality' masks issue. Ie no reusing the one you bought two years ago or the three for a pound jobs off the market. You think the government is going to be able to compel people to spend money on masks, in the middle of a spiralling cost of living crisis, after the having shat all over the covid regulations previously to the extent that the Prime fucking Minister and Chancellor both got fined? Pull the other one.

Covid is expensive too - lost time to sickness, lost time to long covid, people leaving the workforce, customers who don't want to use businesses when covid rates are high, healthcare costs, people having to wait for healthcare due to ill staff. The consequences of deciding not to try (even imperfectly, even with some people not doing anything) to reduce covid are significant.

Covid is expensive too - lost time to sickness, lost time to long covid, people leaving the workforce, customers who don't want to use businesses when covid rates are high, healthcare costs, people having to wait for healthcare due to ill staff. The consequences of deciding not to try (even imperfectly, even with some people not doing anything) to reduce covid are significant.

Which will make not two shits of difference to people who are struggling to cope with basic costs and can't afford to put the heating on, who've nothing left already and who have zero interest in incurring further costs because you've come up with what you consider to be a convincing argument on a societal level.

The problem here is that you, like many people who want some form of mandatory mask return, base your argument around what you think might happen if people would just all fall into line and comply with mask rules, buy those FFP3s and wear them properly. That is not going to happen. It isn't one of the options we are choosing from.

The government could perfectly easily strongly recommend better quality masks even without making it a legal requirement. A strong public health recommendation to wear those would give lots more people 'permission' to wear masks like that and more would do so. You still wouldn't have to if you didn't want to! (And nor would you if it was mandatory as it's so easy to claim an exemption.) It's not all or nothing.

Of course if they did recommend that, that would suggest covid hadn't gone away and was still worth avoiding, and they don't want to do that because they want it to look like a win, like it's over. That's pretty crap for all the extra people who will avoidably get covid because of politics though.

Recommendations are fine, but the OP talked about a law and this subdiscussion over the last few pages is about making it mandatory on public transport and in supermarkets. Compulsory and advised are two very, very different things.

I get that there are people with very strong interests in not wanting covid to seem like a current rather than a past risk, and in not wanting even a hint of the idea that ordinary people (including those on the bones of their arse) might have any kind of entitlement to clean air. Public health recommendations (or rules) around masks both give the wrong impression that what we breathe might matter and that covid hasn't gone away, so we won't even get the milder 'It would be a good idea to wear the best mask you can' recommendation, never mind actual rules from TfL or anything like that. Don't kid yourself this is some noble endeavour in the interests of ordinary people without much money though.

It could be mandatory and perfectly ignorable by many people - more like littering - but it would still send an important message about the value of trying to avoid transmitting covid. I don't think the government's motives for not sending that message are in the interests of most of us ordinary people.

No. Masks are completely pointless. I feel sorry for you as your health anxiety is clearly affecting how you think. Maybe think about therapy? Getting ill is part of life.

Getting ill is part of life. Advocating for much more illness is something else.

“but we’re not asking people to wear masks FOREVER, it’s just for a few weeks for an emergency!” people still going strong after 2.5 years I see.

Nope, no, never again.

Your last sentence is nonsensical. Pointing out the undoubted reality that a population dealing with a spiralling cost of living crisis will in many cases be unable to afford or be unreceptive to a law telling them to buy FFP3s involves no assumption at all about nobility or otherwise. It just means appraising the facts of the situation.

The fact is that we are talking about mask laws, which are very different to guidance, and that mask laws at this point are a terrible idea. The suggestion has nothing whatsoever to recommend it.

I don't think masks should be mandatory and i hadn't worn one in a while until i caught a cold last week, which was bound to happen with all coughing and sneezing all over the place on my commute.

I live in a big city with tourists and see few people wearing masks.