Honestly, if COVID has taught us anything, it's that people are on average should be treated as children, because it's pretty clear they aren't capable of rational decision making.
So from here, the issue is that common sense was shot down in favor of credentialism. I wore a mask starting in March because it was common sense, and I was given scientific arguments for not wearing them. Because, science. That I observed medical professionals wearing them, and east Asian citizens doing this for decades already, was irrelevant in the face of credentialed spokespeople from large organizations arguing that up was down and down was up.
So then the idea that people are children and should be treated as such becomes very elitist if taken like this.
Other things people said:
* N95s have a short shelf-life. Complete bullshit. The real first POF is the elasticated band. If that's fine, your fit will probably be fine. We knew this wasn't true so my 10 year old masks were still legit.
* N95s require a lot of training for fit. The fit test is trivial to do. We knew this but lots of people on HN and authorities claimed this wasn't the case.
* N95s cannot be reused. This was highly likely to be nonsense. The virus doesn't survive on surfaces for very long and that was the high probability event. After all, viruses rarely mutate so that they're terrible in all ways. i.e. this virus likely behaves like other coronaviruses except for a few variations.
And of course those with our half-mask respirators printed our exhale valves and placed our P100s in them and were full protected.
There was a lot of misinformation going around by people who just didn't know very much and were very eager to sound authoritative. They were all about "sources" and "citations" that are just parrot views (i.e. single primary source, many secondary sources giving the impression of consensus).
People made fun of the tech industry for how they handled it, too. Techies (being coddled millennial snowflakes) shut down before any government, stopped business flights to/from China, and started working from home and wearing masks earlier.
Honestly, my biggest mistake was that I was one of the few in my group of friends who believed the US had competent bureaucrats and so I stayed in the market while my friends sold ahead of the crash. Welp.
https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-human-os/biomedical/devices/on...
I have an N95 I've worn for the week. I can fill it up with water in the sink and it won't drip any water out. What the hell is going on there..
Though even that is magnitudes better than nothing.
They had it wrong for a few weeks, okay. But they changed their guidelines, and there was new data showing the efficacy of wearing masks(at least the combination of the masks and the social behavior they encourage), and they have stuck to those guidelines for nearly 8 months now.
I'm honestly amazed how long people are being hung up on that single, one-way change in guidelines during the early weeks. It's unfortunate the guidelines didn't come sooner. But looking at the timeline, where we were then, and where we are now.. The totality of it all.. IDK, it's weird seeing people constantly bringing it up and blaming public health official. Especially considering what the messaging from non-health public officials has been over the past 8 months and 300k deaths.
Stuff was confusing as it was in April. I argued with people about masks then. Normal, rational people, who didn't see this update and sudden change of tune. The information noise level was high in those days, which didn't help.
Instead of organizing PPE distribution and informing people that it might come to mandatory mask wearing, the message was a very dumb "well, maybe, but really think of the shortage and well, it's a hard question". :/
Nevertheless, IHME was kept in the spotlight by the government and media because they deemed the experts as an independent health research center at a reputable university. Their predictions drove many poor policy decisions, culminating in the infamous claim by Trump that the pandemic would be over soon after Easter. Many epidemiologists, statisticians, physicists, mathematicians etc. called their conclusions into question and built better models (mostly using SEIR / SEIS). It took several more months for IHME to improve their own model, but by then the damage was already done.
Science bias leads you to come down hard that things that aren't proven are false. No hard proof double blind studies that masks work with covid19 means mask don't work.
Credentialist bias makes you assume people without are stupid and need to be tricked to do the right thing.
Whoever decided lying to the public about masks to make sure health care workers had PPE should be prosecuted IMO.
Plus as far as I'm aware there was no lying, it was a very wishy-washy diversion, woes about PPE shortage due to China shut down, and 5D chessing about trying to not worsen the shortage instead of giving a simple and clear answer, that "yes, they unquestionably help [healthcare workers use them for a reason!], but we'll be stockpiling every shipment for later".
You know what she has never done that I can remember? Belittled them, talked down to them or not considered that they were _humans_ with their own goals and values. I can't say that she never lied to us (Santa Claus etc) and of course sometimes she would force us to got to bed or do homework or whatever, but it seems obvious that she genuinely cared at all times and she was happy when you were able to do something new or achieved something.
The vibe I have seen from those in power and their supporters have been one of arrogance and utter contempt bordering on hatred for the masses that won't blindly obey them. They have no interest in protecting the population, they are just there for the power.
I think Fauci did care, a few others probably did too, but the general tone on twitter, reddit and the media was one of contempt.
I vaguely follow a (real) conservative on twitter, and she was also pretty arrogant but obviously from the other side, so this is a bipartisan issue, I think.
I think a mask is meaningless walking outside on the sidewalk; if virus particles survive past six feet and through wind then we have bigger problems ; no, the mask mandate makes sense in stores, workplace hallways and bathrooms, hair salons and stuff like that.
It's complex to tell people to wear a mask in specific situations so the authorities say to wear it all the time, which feels oppressive. It's complex to tell people not to hoard things so we lied and told the public masks weren't recommended until June.
Now the gloves thing is a mystery to me. Do people not have control over their hands? The virus doesn't enter the hands, it enters the face-holes, but the hands have to be close to the face-holes to enter, where they bind to receptors in the airways. The virus-facehole transit route exists even if you wear gloves.
A few months back I saw someone sitting outside, on a park bench, mask on chin while they ate a sandwich -- with their gloves.
Yeah, it can be the case that people are dumb-dumbs AND our institutions are awful at messaging strategy.
Unfortunately early on it was viewed as masks or social distance, with both competing for the top spot in the prevention hierarchy.
The truth is masks help, but no where near as much as social distancing. I also think this was a misfire of harm reduction vs prevention.
Stay home, and if you have to go out wear a mask was probably the right messaging. Along with masks are not fool proof and you can still get sick, so really minimize interactions.
This is far from a good thing, but I believe you've got the cause, or at least blame, mostly wrong.
Interesting note? Right at the beginning of the crisis Republicans trusted the CDC more than Dems.
People don't like being lied to "for their own good" or whatever. This is the Red Cross Doughnut moment. It's over for trust in public health institutions.