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Comment by yosito | Hacker News Reader

N95s are effective, but I really don't understand the endgame of healthy, vaccinated people wearing N95s at this point. I know there are benefits in certain high risk situations, but covid is going nowhere, are we really gonna spend the rest of our lives wearing masks everywhere? At a certain point, we just need to accept that life comes with risks and we can't avoid them all, and trying to just ruins our ability to enjoy life.

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I expect I'll get infected eventually. I'd prefer not to get infected at a point when the system is (about to be) overloaded.

Omicron can't be meaningfully stopped, but it can be rate limited.

It goes two ways - you spreading it, and you catching it.

From the spreading perspective, even if you are healthy and vaccinated, you might have it and you might be spreading it. Especially with omicron variant.

And from the catching perspective, even if you're careful, vaccinated, boosted, etc. you still can catch it and get sick. Maybe it's not going to kill you, but it turns you into a potential spreader.

I never panicked in the past about spreading the flu. I'd wear a mask and avoid visiting grandma if I were sick. But I won't live in a bubble just because there are things in the world that could hurt people. You can't reduce risk to zero. Why are we willing to fuck everything up to try?

Everyone will catch it. At best wearing masks will only delay that a little. Fortunately the vaccines and other therapies are pretty effective at preventing severe symptoms.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/opinion/vinay-prasad/94646

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