Commentary by Samuel Strait – June 6, 2022

Personally, I don’t know how many studies on the effectiveness, or
rather lack of effectiveness of masking, need to be conducted before it
is universally accepted that masking serves no purpose as a mechanism
for preventing Covid-19 infection.  Nor does it prevent transmission to
others.  The most recent study conducted here in the United States by
the University of Louisville found no conclusive difference between
infection rate of the masked over those that did not mask up.  Further
details from the Louisville study concluded the disturbing information
that masking for prolonged periods of time could actually have negative
consequences for the wearer.  Apparently, at least up to now,
researchers have largely ignored such negative consequences.

Two even more recent studies conducted in Western Europe have found
masking to be similarly ineffective for preventing infection from the
virus or acting as a preventative from infecting others. The two studies
continue with the warning similar to the University of Louisville study,
that mask wearing was very likely to have serious consequences for the
wearer.  Both studies take things a step further by indicating that
there is a “moderate positive correlation between mask usage and deaths
in Western Europe”.

The bottom line in all of the continued research into the use of masking
as a technique for preventing the spread of viruses is that there are
distinct and serious consequences for those that continue to mask up. 
The bombshell comes in the form of a new work published in a medical
journal that is comparing infection rates in Kansas during 2020 that
alleges mask wearing led to a heightened risk of death.   Dr. Zacharias
Fogen, publishing in Medicine, February 2022, produced the following
observational study “The Foegen Effect:  A Mechanism by Which Facemasks
Contribute to the Covid-19 Case Fatality Rate”.   The study concluded,
contrary to accepted medical theory that fewer people are dying because
infection rates are reduced by masks, this was not the case.

Study results conclude that mask mandates and continous mask usage
actually caused death at a rate 1.5 times higher than those who were
maskless.  In simple terms 50% more deaths in areas with mask mandates
over those without mandates.  A follow up study whose results were
published in April of 2022 in the Cureus Journal of Medical Science
found nearly identical results from analyzing the correlation between
mask usage against morbidity and mortality rates in the 2020-2021 winter
in Europe.  For some this new evidence that masking may contain “new”
and unknown hazards to health will likely not be compelling enough to
ditch their masks. After all masking has become such a virtuous art form
for many on the left and they are welcome to it.

Recent efforts by the Biden administration to overturn a court decision
to ditch masking on public transportation is currently under way.  So
much for science when there are political postures to maintain.  Likely
should any resurgence of the virus going forward occur, masking will be
one of the political policies put in place in spite of real science
saying “not so fast”.   Various places in California are already
resorting to a return to indoor masking with a recent uptick in cases
surrounding San Francisco. Local areas where “Public Health” is
returning to such mandates would be wise to resist such measures as
negative to good personal health and safety.