Double Mask Double Talk

Yesterday, the CDC updated its masking guidelines. We've been in this pretty much a full year, the pandemic surges and wanes, and the CDC's answer is we need to wear two masks now instead of one, since nothing else has worked.

After months of demands for federal health officials to update mask recommendations, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced new guidelines Wednesday that include wearing well-fitting face masks or two masks at a time to help curb the COVID-19 pandemic.

The updated guidance follows the release of new research from the CDC which tested various masks in a lab setting and found evidence that combining a cloth mask over a surgical mask could dramatically reduce both the spread of the virus to others and exposure to the virus oneself.

So over the course of a week, he CDC has done "new research" into whether two masks are better than one? Exactly a week ago, Dr Fauci was saying there was no scientific evidence, just do it.

Dr. Anthony Fauci said there’s no evidence showing two masks are safer than wearing one, despite saying otherwise last week.

“There’s nothing wrong with that, but there’s no data that indicates that that is going to make a difference,” Fauci said during a video livestream interview with the American Federation of Teachers.

. . . His comments come after saying last week that wearing two face masks “likely” provides more protection than wearing just one mask.

I just can't imagine a bunch of CDC lab techs suddenly putting in 20-hour days, working through Super Sunday, to conduct thousands to tests on what masks worn in what combination are safer -- but this is the clear implication of Fauci's remarks. In fact, the implication of the CBS story in the link is that the CDC suddenly did this "after months of demands". Right.

The fact is that over much of the past year, an enormous majority of people have worn masks. In California, you can't buy gas, shop for groceries, go to the post office, go to church, or get a haircut without a mask. Even joggers, who are technically exempt, wear them. The big exception appears to be public transit, where mask rules aren't generally enforced, but this is a government function, oddly enough, when almost everythihng else is enforced privately.

But with 98% of the citizens wearing masks 98% of the time, the virus waxes and wanes irrespective. Nobody gets to ask Dr Fauci why two masks instead of one would change this, but if someone did, I'm sure he'd answer it's "just common sense". But then, why not enforce 12 feet social distance instead of six? Is that "not common sense", maybe because it's just more obviously absurd than wearing two masks? It sounds like they're making things up as they go along.

The new rules about how to wear them, too, srrike me as something made up to sound good. Two disposable masks won't do it. It has to be a disposable mask under a cloth mask, not over it. What about two cloth masks? They don't say. But if I have two cloth masks, will that work? Would a black one need to be outside a red one? These are sartorial restrictions, a new dress code for the new normal, to go along with liturgical revisions and de facto bans on fornication.

I just don't know if anyone will start enforcing the new rule -- two masks required to enter -- or if the mask monitors will also deny entry to someone wearing just two disposable masks. We'll have to see. Citizens will likely cooperate rather than cause a hassle if it happens.

What happened to the vaccine, by the way? Everyone's getting their shots now, right? If the vaccine's gonna solve the problem, why are they talking about two masks now, when everyone's gonna have their vaccine soon?