New Study Finds Mask Mandates Provided No Protection as CDC Misinformed the Public
The most rigorous and comprehensive analysis of scientific studies conducted on the efficacy of masks for reducing the spread of respiratory illnesses — including Covid-19 — was published late last month. Its conclusions, said Tom Jefferson, the Oxford epidemiologist who is its lead author, were unambiguous.
“There is just no evidence that they” — masks — “make any difference,” he told the journalist Maryanne Demasi. “Full stop.”
But, wait, hold on. What about N-95 masks, as opposed to lower-quality surgical or cloth masks?
“Makes no difference — none of it,” said Jefferson.
What about the studies that initially persuaded policymakers to impose mask mandates?
“They were convinced by nonrandomized studies, flawed observational studies.”
What about the utility of masks in conjunction with other preventive measures, such as hand hygiene, physical distancing or air filtration?
“There’s no evidence that many of these things make any difference.”
These observations don’t come from just anywhere. Jefferson and 11 colleagues conducted the study for Cochrane, a British nonprofit that is widely considered the gold standard for its reviews of health care data. The conclusions were based on 78 randomized controlled trials, six of them during the Covid pandemic, with a total of 610,872 participants in multiple countries. And they track what has been widely observed in the United States: States with mask mandates fared no better against Covid than those without.
No study — or study of studies — is ever perfect. Science is never absolutely settled. What’s more, the analysis does not prove that proper masks, properly worn, had no benefit at an individual level. People may have good personal reasons to wear masks, and they may have the discipline to wear them consistently. Their choices are their own.
But when it comes to the population-level benefits of masking, the verdict is in: Mask mandates were a bust. Those skeptics who were furiously mocked as cranks and occasionally censored as “misinformers” for opposing mandates were right. The mainstream experts and pundits who supported mandates were wrong. In a better world, it would behoove the latter group to acknowledge their error, along with its considerable physical, psychological, pedagogical and political costs.
Don’t count on it. In congressional testimony this month, Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, called into question the Cochrane analysis’s reliance on a small number of Covid-specific randomized controlled trials and insisted that her agency’s guidance on masking in schools wouldn’t change. If she ever wonders why respect for the C.D.C. keeps falling, she could look to herself, and resign, and leave it to someone else to reorganize her agency.
That, too, probably won’t happen: We no longer live in a culture in which resignation is seen as the honorable course for public officials who fail in their jobs.
But the costs go deeper. When people say they “trust the science,” what they presumably mean is that science is rational, empirical, rigorous, receptive to new information, sensitive to competing concerns and risks. Also: humble, transparent, open to criticism, honest about what it doesn’t know, willing to admit error.
The C.D.C.’s increasingly mindless adherence to its masking guidance is none of those things. It isn’t merely undermining the trust it requires to operate as an effective public institution. It is turning itself into an unwitting accomplice to the genuine enemies of reason and science — conspiracy theorists and quack-cure peddlers — by so badly representing the values and practices that science is supposed to exemplify.
It also betrays the technocratic mind-set that has the unpleasant habit of assuming that nothing is ever wrong with the bureaucracy’s well-laid plans — provided nobody gets in its way, nobody has a dissenting point of view, everyone does exactly what it asks, and for as long as officialdom demands. This is the mentality that once believed that China provided a highly successful model for pandemic response.
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Mask mandates now revealed to be a complete waste of time and a junk science fraud, but have politicians learned from the error of their ways?
Late last month, the most rigorous and comprehensive analysis of scientific studies looking into the efficacy (or lack thereof) of Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) face masks was published by an Oxford epidemiologist who flat-out admitted that the plastic-laden mouth and nose veils are certifiably useless.
There is just no evidence that they make any difference,” admitted Tom Jefferson, the review’s lead author, to journalist Maryanne Demasi.
Even N-95 masks, which we were told by the experts are “superior” to the cheap Chinese blue cloth masks that were handed out like candy – and that are now floating used and contaminated in the world’s oceans – are a worthless joke.
“Makes no difference – none of it,” Jefferson said.
As for the “studies” the government trotted out as “evidence” that masks work, Jefferson told Demasi that they are all corrupt and never should have been accepted as “sound science.”
“They were convinced by non-randomized studies, flawed observational studies,” he explained.
What about using masks in conjunction with other proposed guidelines like excessive hand washing, “social distancing,” and air filtration systems? These, too, are useless, according to the science.
“There’s no evidence that many of these things make any difference,” Jefferson revealed.
(Related: The corrupt CDC knew from the beginning that masks were useless, providing no real protection against covid, but pushed them anyway.)
Wearing a mask to avoid covid is just dumb
Jefferson and 11 of his colleagues put together the work for Cochrane, an esteemed British non-profit that is widely considered to be the gold standard for reviews of health care data.
For their research, Jefferson et al. looked at 78 randomized controlled trials, six of which were published during the covid scamdemic. A total of 610,872 participants from multiple countries were included in the trials.
In a nutshell, the review determined that states with mask mandates fared no better than states without them in terms of covid cases, hospitalizations, and deaths. Masks are just a political symbol, in other words, not a viable medical intervention.
No matter what type of mask a person uses, the effects are the same: they do nothing except making breathing more difficult, not to mention whatever toxins are present in their material.
“People may have good personal reasons to wear masks, and they may have the discipline to wear them consistently,” DNYUZ reports. “Their choices are their own.”
“But when it comes to the population-level benefits of masking, the verdict is in: Mask mandates were a bust. Those skeptics who were furiously mocked as cranks and occasionally censored as ‘misinformers’ for opposing mandates were right. The mainstream experts and pundits who supported mandates were wrong. In a better world, it would behoove the latter group to acknowledge their error, along with its considerable physical, psychological, pedagogical and political costs.”
Unfortunately for modern society, it is no longer considered honorable for public officials who fail in their jobs to resign. Were that still the case, there would be a lot of public office vacancies across the land at this point, including and especially at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
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Report: Gavin Newsom Underestimated California Deficit by $7 Billion
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D)’s projected budget deficit of $22.5 billion may have been too low by $7 billion, according to a report last week by the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO).
As Fox News notes, Newsom told Californians last month to expect a $22.5 billion deficit in the coming fiscal year — after a surplus of $100 billion, driven in part by federal grants for coronavirus relief spending.
Now, the LAO says, the deficit may be even worse. In a new report, it states (emphasis added):
Due to a deteriorating revenue picture relative to expectations from June 2022, both our office and the administration anticipate the state faces a budget problem in 2023‑24. Although the Governor’s budget revenue estimates are reasonable, they are likely a bit too high. In particular, using recent revenue collections and economic data, we estimate there is a two‑in‑three chance that state revenues will be lower than the Governor’s budget estimates for 2022‑23 and 2023‑24. Our best estimate is that revenues for these two years will be roughly $10 billion lower—implying a larger budget problem by about $7 billion. (Many other factors also will affect the actual size of the budget problem.) That said, after adjusting for inflation, anticipated revenues for 2023‑24 still would remain about 20 percent higher than before the pandemic.
California’s budget tends to be volatile because it relies heavily on taxing the highest earners in the state, whose income fluctuates with the fortunes of the stock market.
Newsom and the state’s Democrats used the surplus to spend on various left-wing priorities, including health insurance for all residents — including those in the country illegally.
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Cyber Attack on Produce Giant Dole Shuts Down Production Plants in North America
A cyber attack on produce giant Dole shut down production plants, according to a company memo obtained by CNN.
“Dole Food Company is in the midst of a Cyber Attack and have subsequently shut down our systems throughout North America,” Emanuel Lazopoulos, senior vice president at Dole’s Fresh Vegetables division, said in a February 10 memo to retailers, according to CNN.
The hack, which is being reported as a ransomware, led to a shortage of Dole salad kits.
Some customers noticed Dole salad kits were not in stock in stores on Tuesday.
Dole said it contained the threat and “engaged leading third-party cybersecurity experts” to secure its systems.
CNN reported:
A cyberattack earlier this month forced produce giant Dole to temporarily shut down production plants in North America and halt food shipments to grocery stores, according to a company memo about the incident obtained by CNN.
The previously unreported hack — which a source familiar with the incident said was ransomware — led some grocery shoppers to complain on Facebook in recent days that store shelves were missing Dole-made salad kits.
Dole has four processing plants in the US and employs more than 3,000 people, according to a recent company press release.
After CNN published this story on Wednesday afternoon, Dole spokesperson William Goldfield sent CNN a statement confirming that ransomware was the cause of the incident.
“The company has notified law enforcement about the incident and are cooperating with their investigation,” Dole’s statement said in part. “While continuing to investigate the scope of the incident, the impact to Dole operations has been limited.”
A cyberattack on Dole was the cause of the salad shortage, Adam Wolfe, the store’s manager, told CNN, citing the Dole memo, which he said his store received from its wholesale grocery provider, Affiliated Foods Inc., in Texas.
Russell, the produce manager, rattled off the salad kits his store was out of on Tuesday, the most recent full day of inventory, from Dole Chopped Sesame to Dole Butter Bliss.
“They [customers] are upset, but it happens,” Russell told CNN. “We can’t do nothing about it except [put in the orders].”
Mary Underwood, an employee at Stewart’s Food Store, in Olney, Texas, more than 100 miles west of Dallas, told CNN on Wednesday that the store had struggled to get Dole salads for several days. Customers started asking questions about the bare shelves, Underwood said, prompting the store to post the Dole memo about the cyberattack on its Facebook page.
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