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Government routinely warned against mask use — before it was political

Link here. The article gives numerous examples of state health departments noting the uselessness of masks as well as their potential harmful aspects. For example,

…the California Department of Health, which now obsesses about the use of masks, warned about the inherent harm in wearing masks, especially outdoors:

“Mask use may give the wearer a false sense of security, which might encourage too much physical activity and time spent outdoors. Also, wearing a mask may actually be harmful to some people with heart or lung disease because it can make the lungs work harder to breathe.”

How come nobody is raising any concern about universal masking given the obvious observation that covering one’s face makes the lungs work harder? [emphasis mine]

For anyone who does any research at all into this subject, and is willing to be even slightly honest about it, the data is pretty clear: Masks are likely to provide you no protection from COVID-19, while carrying health risks that are real.

What makes me depressed about all this is that I know I am wasting my breath. My readers might read this, but they mostly agree with me. For the general American populace, no one is interested in hearing anything negative about masks. They want them required by law, as shown by this poll, because it makes them feel safe.

And in our shallow society — plunging headlong into a dark age — feelings must always trump reality. Always. And don’t you dare say otherwise.

Never in my entire life have I ever lived in a culture that demanded such things of others. The country that once existed here was a country that respected the rights of others to live freely as they wished.

No more. Now people see it their right to demand that others agree with them, and follow orders, or else. And the criteria is always what makes them feel good, not what makes sense.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

11 comments

  • janyuary

    It is testimony to your honesty that you believe that poll.
    “We are men of science, Holmes!”

    A poll in November of 2016 showed large, clear majorities rejecting both major party presidential candidates outright. There was no way to poll those who voted for one of the two major candidates holding their noses, as that action forfeits representation. Even so — according to that poll, “the only one that counts,” as the old saying goes, clearly both presidential candidates were loathed by large majorities of those who voted. Those who refused to vote at all because both major party candidates were shams, were legion and remain the great unpolled.

    Polls schmolls! Science requires honesty to numbers, absolutely, but in the art of slinging bull, those same numbers become mere tools for a job. Fifty seven percent is just that, in the eyes of this non-scientist veteran pro bull slinger.

    Stand strong, Robert.

  • janyuary

    Typo … last sentence, Fifty seven percent … 57 … the poll said 75 percent … lysdexia kicked in when I posted, sorry. The idea that only one fourth of Americans object to masks is ludicrous. The poll is a tool for bull slinging.

  • LocalFluff

    I’d love to strap a tight rubber mask to the face of some politicians. And I will guarantee that no virus ain’t gonna that’s kill them!

    This is a test.
    Are people stupid and slavish enough to accept this?
    Or did the PC go over the top this time?

    I understand that they are testing their limits, because no matter what, almost no one seems to protest against their despotism.

    “Embryos and idiots, eremites and friers!”
    – John Milton, Paradise Lost year 1667, book 3 line 474.

  • John

    Way back before all this started in the US, I gave my Dad a few N95s just in case. I knew he would be high risk in any event and I already had the masks.

    Then it hit, and there was a run on N95s. The government was so sure the N95 did nothing for the general public, and the narrative so well parroted, that my Dad called to tell me how how worthless the masks I gave him are.

    I researched N95s before all this started. Are they good or bad? How would they need to be used and what other PPE would be required? Is the current piece of cotton just as good? It doesn’t matter because whatever doesn’t agree with the CURRENT narrative has probably been censored.

    Nothing but lies, lies that conflict with earlier lies. The truth will set you free, but the truth isn’t allowed anymore in this country because it can hurt.

  • Rose

    Did the CDC itself, earlier this year, warn about dangers of wearing a face mask?

    A friend of mine is convinced that she saw such a statement, but I can’t track it down (only finding the earlier CDC statements that they were ineffective in stopping spread among the general public). If they did make such a statement, I’d assume it would be mentioned in articles such as the Daniel Horowitz one linked above.

    Any help with locating such a statement would be appreciated.

    (She says that what she saw long predated this hoax letter which appeared in July: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EdFLZDXXkAA1wCc.jpg )

  • janyuary

    John — the truth is something one arrives at only after investing effort.

    One can have mentors and teachers to show how to seek truth and what tools, such as common sense, to use, but the only way one gets truth, is to invest individual effort. Truth is always allowed — so are illusions, often confused with truth.

    But for truth, one must know that it is never given or taken away — one must invest personal effort to find it where it is.

  • J Fincannon

    Rose,
    You won’t find the CDC statement because they updated their webpage and the data was lost. Except if you go to Archive.org.

    https://web.archive.org/web/20200229135433/https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/prevention-treatment.html

    “CDC does not recommend that people who are well wear a facemask to protect themselves from respiratory diseases, including COVID-19.”

    Who knows what other versions of that page have other mask recommendations?

  • Rose

    Thank you J, but I’m looking specifically for a CDC page which warned about potential dangers of mask use (if it ever existed), not those such as this one which simply didn’t recommend their use by the general public.

  • wayne

    John–
    Take a look at the packaging for any of these toy-masks—“for cosmetic purposes only, not for medical use.” (not to mention “Made in China”) Just think of them like— the Chinese got a jump on Halloween sales, cuz’ that is what they are, costumes.
    The FDA changed their entire labelling rules for the current Crisi; cosmetic-masks can be temporarily sold & used as PPE “until the Emergency Order is rescinded.”
    –Cotton doesn’t filter viruses or fine particulate, it just doesn’t.

    LocalFluff-
    Good stuff.

    J Fincannon–
    Good deal on using the Wayback Machine at the Archive!

  • Desmond Murphy

    Why do countries such as Japan and Korea with high percentage of mask wearing in public have much lower rates of infection?

  • Edward

    Desmond Murphy asked: “Why do countries such as Japan and Korea with high percentage of mask wearing in public have much lower rates of infection?

    The percentage of mask wearers was not very high in those countries, it was just a few people at the start. Other factors that had been noted in February and March are the reason for the lower rates of infection. Some countries, including Japan and Korea, had learned from previous flu seasons and implemented effective measures early on, such as contact tracing and quarantine. The rest of the world could not effectively implement such measures until after it was too late.

    The U.S, is having especially high rates for two reasons. 1) Early in the outbreak, various Democrats declared that it was racist to not hug a Chinese person fresh off the plane from China, and sending infected people into nursing homes didn’t help at all, and B) infection rates are not just current infections but include those who have ever been infected, as well as death rates including not only those who died due to Wuhan flu but also those who tested positive for the flu or the antibodies (were infected, but are no longer infected) as well as people who were suspected of having Wuhan virus (e.g. once met someone who later tested positive) or were assumed to have the virus (the hospital finds it easier to collect emergency funds from the government than regular compensation from the insurance companies, so assuming Wuhan is easier and more profitable). The data is corrupted.

    Oh, and III) infection rates aren’t being reported in the U.S. so much as a running total of all the tests that have come back positive, even if it is a retest of the same person. Calling them cases merely makes the infection fatality rate and the case fatality rate the same. This whole panicdemic is being run by idiots and amateurs.

    Daleth) New York showed that about half the infections occurred in people who had been locked down and the other half were in essential employees, who got out and about. One of the major reasons that flu outbreaks occur in winter is that is the time of year when people remain indoors, where spreading the disease is easier. So why lock us down rather than have us spend our time socially distanced in parks and on beaches?

    v) please remember that infection rates in the U.S. suddenly skyrocketed shortly after the mask mandates were imposed. Coincidence? Our leaders are adamant that increased positive tests are not due to increased testing, and we had already been in lockdown, shutdown, smackdown Great Oppression for months, so the cause of the increase must be from something else. Perhaps it is the masks. The reports are starting to come out that masks are harmful ( https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/dentists-serious-health-issues-from-overuse-of-masks/ ), and our leadership admitted even as it imposed mask madness that masks do nothing but remind us that we are all being screwed — I mean — that we are all in a tragic panicdemic together — but remember to stay separate.

    So maybe Japan and Korea would have even lower rates of infection if masks weren’t used there.

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