Don't dismiss the message because of the poor quality of the messenger.

The article cited by the OP is a poorly written, biased political hit based on a study published in January by the Cochrane Database of Systemic Reviews, a highly respected, leading source of medical information.

It is best to read the actual study, which irresponsibly was not properly referenced in the article.

The Cochrane paper is entitled "Physical interventions to interrupt or reduce the spread of respiratory viruses" and is a meta analysis of all published studies on the effectiveness of masks.

The main conclusions were that the studies failed to show benefit of masks in stopping viral transmission, and that N95 masks were not shown to be superior to medical/surgical masks:

1. "Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of influenza‐like illness (ILI)/COVID‐19 like illness compared to not wearing masks"

2. "Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of laboratory‐confirmed influenza/SARS‐CoV‐2 compared to not wearing masks"

3. "The use of a N95/P2 respirators compared to medical/surgical masks probably makes little or no difference for the objective and more precise outcome of laboratory‐confirmed influenza infection"

4. "One previously reported ongoing RCT has now been published and observed that medical/surgical masks were non‐inferior to N95 respirators in a large study of 1009 healthcare workers in four countries providing direct care to COVID‐19 patients."

In short, if there is a benefit to wearing masks in limiting the spread of Covid (and influenza), after 3 years of pandemic, it has yet to be conclusively demonstrated.

https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD006207.pub6/full

Exactly right. I have friends who have never had Covid. They have never ever worn a mask except when forced to do so and have never had any vaccination. Some people get sick and some do not. My experience with Covid after wearing a mask AND having all vaccinations up to date was much less than a few sniffles that might accompany a head cold, basically NOTHING. Others, with and without the vaccinations have been much worse.

When I look back at Bullshit POS Biden, as he should be called across the planet, and think about our first responders and military men and women who were forced to leave the military or their job assignment when forced to leave I can't tell you how much I hate the lying corrupt Left Wingers who force their asinine stupid ridiculous beliefs on the rest of us.

Dennis

The other side of the coin, of course, is the harm that forced mask-wearing has been done, particularly in terms of early childhood development. Masks make it harder to hear and understand speech, to observe the mouths of speakers, and to identify facial expressions and emotions. Brain development may suffer, especially the areas concerned with language, comprehension, coordination of all the muscles required for correct speech development, and the understanding of facial expression and emotion. Not to mention potential psychological impacts of having to cover one's face under penalty of punishment.

During the peak of Covid, one of my grandkids aged 3 at the time, was referred to a speech therapist who insisted that both the patient and the therapist wore masks during the sessions. Absurd.

For those who value politics over science, and therefore discount these points as mere political bias, here's an article from one of the Left's holy grails of news media, NPR. Their article points out how the U.S. was and is an "outlier" by mandating masks for kids age 2 and up; WHO recommended over age 5 and the EU recommended over age 10.

https://www.npr.org/2022/01/28/1075842341/growing-calls-to-take-masks-off-children-in-school