Masks just make you feel hot and itchy around the mouth, and I hear dermatologists are thriving these days. How long do we have to keep wearing them?

he's just saying what most people are thinking

Why are so many MPs here so tone deaf? No such thing as leading by example neither.

Until the whole population has been vaccinated?

Hello Kitty. I thought you had a solution and then I saw the question mark at the end of your sentence. Does anyone have an answer?

Well Taro-kun, the sooner your guvmint stops messing about expending resources and effort on the dead Olympics and concentrates on getting the population vaccinated, the sooner it’ll be safe for you to take your mask off.

Instead of sitting there complaining, get off your bony backside and do your job. As finance minister, shouldn’t you be busy arranging financial support for all the small businesses that have lost custom/had to close due to the pandemic?

Not being able to earn a living and put food on the table is way more of a problem than having to wear a sweaty mask in public.

Priorities, Taro. Priorities.

As long as you choose to wear it.

Hello, does he even know what’s happening in the world?

Hello to you too!

I think maybe even Taro Aso knows what's happening in the world.

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/do-masks-stop-the-spread-of-covid-19-

Everyone knows its all performance art at this point.

Loosely translated, perhaps it was: ”Rebreathing my own carbon dioxide and alcohol from the previous nights’ steak dinner always makes me sleepy in the next day’s Diet meeting. How long do we have to keep wearing them?“

Before, now, and always will be ‘out-of touch’ with the rest of the population.

We have a saying in my country” we can not blame a donkey for being a donkey”

Born rich, no social skills or feelings.

the man is an embarrassment

When shopping or in an area that negates social distances, where a flipping mask.

Your life, your senior family members are venerable

This prehistoric waste of space has some other hits like “married couples with no children are selfish” (his boss at the time, Abe, is childless), and don’t forget “I wish old people would hurry up and die”.

@bob

Your Spectator article is focused on numbers becoming infected when wearing a mask. It doesn't look at whether wearing masks can prevent the wearer spreading the infection.

@albaleo - better alert the CDC their numbers are all wrong. Their research shows an effectiveness in lowering rate of infection at a similar negligible number. Within the margin of error.

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7010e3.htm

The science is long since settled. Masks don't work. Its pure theatre now and everyone knows it

better alert the CDC their numbers are all wrong. Their research shows an effectiveness in lowering rate of infection at a similar negligible number. Within the margin of error

The science is long since settled. Masks don't work. Its pure theatre now and everyone knows it

The science is settled, but the problem is that you keep failing to understand what is being reported.

There is a huge difference between the effectiveness of mask use and effectiveness of mask mandates, (and reduction in growth is not the same as a reduction on the final numbers)

In reality the scientific consensus is that mask do work and a re an effective part of the tools for the control of the transmission.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02801-8

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7191274/

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2776536

https://www.pnas.org/content/118/4/e2014564118

It would be as easy as checking the official position of professional scientific and medical organizations, none say that mask are useless, because the evidence at this point cannot be ignored.

The science is settled, but the problem is that you keep failing to understand what is being reported.

The science is settled indeed, but the problem is you don't like what is being reported.

Nobody can say masks work with a straight face today.

Pure theatre and you know it.

Pure theatre and you know it.

So, that is your reply against the scientific articles that prove you wrong?

not even a single argument? pretending you cannot read something does not make it disappears, only helps proving you have no point.

Masks are useful and should be worn by those who treat Covid and those who have Covid. But for the general population they provide very little benefit. Mask mandates are pretty much useless.

Masks are useful and should be worn by those who treat Covid and those who have Covid. But for the general population they provide very little benefit. Mask mandates are pretty much useless.

That is wrong and as demonstrated by the scientific articles I already provided they are a very beneficial measure when adopted by the general population. Mask mandates can also be useful when they are well supported so they cause a change on the population's conduct.

In places like Japan mandates would not be as useful because the population already are using masks without needing a mandate for it.

So, that is your reply against the scientific articles that prove you wrong? 

not even a single argument? pretending you cannot read something does not make it disappears, only helps proving you have no point.

Its actually funny at this point that you ignore the overwhelming evidence that proves you wrong.

Floundering is a polite description of what you're doing right now,

Science is on my side. Fear his on yours.

Its actually funny at this point that you ignore the overwhelming evidence that proves you wrong.

Again, what do you have to say about the 3 articles that proved you wrong?

Not a single thing? it is clear for anybody who is the one ignoring the evidence,

If science is on your side, how come you failed to produce the statements from scientific or medical organizations that support your mistaken opinion? silence also on that?

How long do we have to keep wearing them?

Until pharma gets to their beloved "herd immunity" including all children (trials on infants and children under 12 have already begun with Moderna...Pfizer starts in April and J&J wants to inject pregnant women along with children - Go Pharma).

Masks are useful and should be worn by those who treat Covid and those who have Covid. But for the general population they provide very little benefit. Mask mandates are pretty much useless.

Exactly @Raw Beer and CDC's multi-million dollar study over major cities/counties all over the US (over several months from 2020) shows exactly how effective masks are (not):

https://thehighwire.com/videos/del-debunks-cdc-mask-spin/

If you can smell 2nd hand smoke your mask is pretty much useless (basically air just passes through side openings) BUT it does make people around you who are uneasy feel more comfortable.

Until pharma gets to their beloved "herd immunity" including all children (trials on infants and children under 12 have already begun with Moderna...Pfizer starts in April and J&J wants to inject pregnant women along with children - Go Pharma).

It is not "pharma" who wants the population to be immunized (for any pharmacological company the more infections there are the more profit they will get) The ones interested in protecting the population are the medical experts that have proved the vaccines to be much safer than the infection and that immunizing the population can let it relax the other measures that prevent infection.

Exactly @Raw Beer and CDC's multi-million dollar study over major cities/counties all over the US (over several months from 2020) shows exactly how effective masks are (not):

Again, you are confused between mask use and mask mandates, your mistaken interpretation of the results have already been debunked and I have already provided links to studies that prove that Masks are a very useful tool for the containment of the infection.

f you can smell 2nd hand smoke your mask is pretty much useless (basically air just passes through side openings) BUT it does make people around you who are uneasy feel more comfortable.

That is false, and against the professional opinion of every scientific and medical association of the world, your personal opinion without basis on scientific data cannot be compared with that.

Exactly @Raw Beer and CDC's multi-million dollar study over major cities/counties all over the US (over several months from 2020) shows exactly how effective masks are (not):

https://thehighwire.com/videos/del-debunks-cdc-mask-spin/

Again, you are confused between mask use and mask mandates, your mistaken interpretation of the results have already been debunked and I have already provided links to studies that prove that Masks are a very useful tool for the containment of the infection.

If you can smell 2nd hand smoke your mask is pretty much useless (basically air just passes through side openings) BUT it does make people around you who are uneasy feel more comfortable.

That is false, and against the professional opinion of every scientific and medical association of the world, your personal opinion without basis on scientific data cannot be compared with that.

No one is stopping you from believing what you believe. This multi-million dollar massive study is from the CDC over many months. If you feel you are above the CDC and "every scientific and medical association of the world" on masking up then more power to you.

No one is stopping you from believing what you believe.

Contrary to science denialist conspiracies, this is not related to any belief.

It can be proved scientifically that mask work, and there have been already many studies that prove it, your mistake is thinking that "mask use" and "mask mandate" are the same thing when obviously that is wrong.

The conclusions from the CDC studies also prove you wrong, and you would know it if you had read it directly instead of copy-pasting a biased and mistaken information from an antivaxxer site that has been found lying repeatedly about almost anything they publish, from the pandemic to the origins of autism.

For your reference the conclusions of the article you did not read.

Community mitigation measures can help reduce the transmission of SARS-CoV-2. In this study, mask mandates were associated with reductions in COVID-19 case and death growth rates within 20 days, whereas allowing on-premises dining at restaurants was associated with increases in COVID-19 case and death growth rates after 40 days. With the emergence of more transmissible COVID-19 variants, community mitigation measures are increasingly important as part of a larger strategy to decrease exposure to and reduce transmission of SARS-CoV-2. Community mitigation policies, such as state-issued mask mandates and prohibition of on-premises restaurant dining, have the potential to slow the spread of COVID-19, especially if implemented with other public health strategies.

So, do you feel above the CDC to be able to contradict their conclusions on their own study? even if you are based on nothing?

@ virusrex,

From your replies to bob and neowave, it seems that you accept that mask mandates have little or no effect, yet you seem to disagree with my comment that for the general population masks provide very little benefit and mask mandates are pretty much useless.

From your replies to bob and neowave, it seems that you accept that mask mandates have little or no effect, yet you seem to disagree with my comment that for the general population masks provide very little benefit and mask mandates are pretty much useless.

No, I can accept a mandate could have little effect (for example in Japan, where mask use is nearly universal, so a mandate would do nothing to increase the very large effect it already has). On the other hand the scientific evidence is clear in that mask are a very effective measure to prevent the spreading, so mask mandates can also be a very effective measure in those places where they make a difference in the number of people that use them.

How do you discuss the evidence presented in the 3 articles I already referenced? They do prove very strongly that masks do have an important effect, and the CDC article also supports this, even in a situation where a mask mandate effect is diluted because of several other factors acting on the population (from lack of other necessary measures to good levels of mask use even in absence of mandates).