Name:   MartiniMan - Subject:   Not my opinion Date:   6/17/2020 3:22:40 PM

The facts are what they are.....had the shelter in place been necessary when it ended everywhere it ended there would have been an explosion in cases.  Two of my adult children live in Austin and they have not relaxed anything in their county and they are seeing a slight increase in cases for some reason.  In other places where the rules have been relaxed nothing has happened.  There does not appear to be a correlation.

And of course we know now that large gatherings are likewise not an issue as we have been lectured to about the peaceful protests and riots.....of course a Trump rally or a Church gathering is like committing murder.  Such is the brain dead world of 2020.  

As for doctors, they are like economists.  Get two in the room and they can look at the same data and give opposing viewpoints.  I had my physical last week and my internist didn't wear a mask but the nurses sort of did but not very diligently.  I asked him about it and he told me they don't really prevent anything.  His opinion of course.  He did say that the issue had not been studied extensively and that there have been lots of contradictory results in the studies that have been done.  So here's the bottom line on the issue for me as expressed by Ben Cowling, head of the Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at The Hong Kong University:  "There's been enough research done to be able to confidently say that masks wouldn't be able to stop the spread of infection, that they would only have a small effect on transmission," Cowling said. "We shouldn't be relying on masks to help us go back to normal."   He has the same concerns I do about the false sense of security that masks provide.  And bear in mind, he is talking about all masks from N95 to surgical to homemade ones.  One area of agreement is that the homemade ones provide very little protection.  More against droplets but very little to none for aerosols.  Wear the mask but keep social distancing and washing hands because they matter much more.