Friday, June 26, 2020

Masks and Parachutes


So the latest anti-mask argument making the rounds is: there's no point in wearing them because any suggestion that wearing masks reduces the transmission of certain airborne contagions is "not validated by any study." Which, so far as I know, is true (at least, I haven't looked for any). And here is something else not validated by any study: there has never, not once, been a scientifically rigorous double-blind study testing whether parachutes are effective at reducing fatalities among people who jump out of airplanes. There exists nary a single peer-reviewed study any pro-parachutists could link to, showing people with parachutes do any better than a parachute-free control group. 
Clearly, then, the only logical, rational conclusion is that parachutes are worthless -- or, at most, are only useful for identifying the cowardly sheeple amongst the skydiving set, eh?

4 Comments:

Blogger Wintermute said...

I read a few Skeptics' blogs, and, actually, studies do show some effectiveness of masks. Neurological Blog, I think, is where I read this. There has also been a meta study of the studies performed so far. Sorry I don't have a link, but it should be easy to find.

5:26 PM  
Blogger Jennifer Abel said...

Thanks! Unfortunately, it won't make a difference to the anti-maskers anyway.

I never imagined THIS would be the rock the "liberty" movement chose to wreck its ship on. I really didn't.

8:36 PM  
Blogger Windypundit said...

Just spotted your post. Here's an RCT study of influenza transmission within households, showing a 50% reduction in transmission for masks: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19193267/

8:51 AM  
Anonymous Peter Hartman said...

Hi thaanks for sharing this

11:07 AM  

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