From day one of this pandemic, it was abundantly clear that outdoor transmission — aside from perhaps an infected individual screaming in someone’s face — is essentially zero. Had the CDC properly conveyed this fact to the public, it could have preserved an amazing quality of life for so many people that would have included continuation of children’s play and sports, seniors enjoying more friendship, fresh air, and vitamin D, and a happier, less depressed society. Yet, to this day, they are continuing to force children to wear masks even outdoors in the summer heat.
In what Rush Limbaugh used to call “a random act of journalism,” New York Times reporter David Leonhardt published a very thorough takedown of the CDC’s outdoor masking guidance. The takedown brings into question how we can trust anything else they tell us when they seem hell-bent on playing up the danger of the virus at all costs and in all situations, over-stating the efficacy of non-pharmaceutical intervention, and underplaying the concerns about side effects from mask-wearing and the vaccines.
Several weeks ago, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky stated at a White House press conference that there’s “increasing data that suggests that most of transmission is happening indoors rather than outdoors.” She gave a number of “less than 10 percent of documented transmission” occurring outdoors.
The problem with this statement is that the number is really much closer to zero, and this fact was known over a year ago. As Leonhardt points out, some epidemiologists he spoke to believe it may be below 0.1 percent, and “almost all” transmission “seems to have involved crowded places or close conversation.”
“Saying that less than 10 percent of Covid transmission occurs outdoors is akin to saying that sharks attack fewer than 20,000 swimmers a year,” writes Leonhardt. “(The actual worldwide number is around 150.) It’s both true and deceiving.”
This is not just a matter of semantics. As the article observes, based on this notion that there is still some very measurable transmission outdoors, the CDC is still recommending all unvaccinated people wear masks outdoors, including children in summer camp. They also continue to give people the impression that one can catch the virus naturally outdoors just casually passing someone, which is continuing to discourage those who are really fearful of the virus from even living normal lives outdoors.
Indeed, not a single known case of casual outdoor transmission has been documented in the entire world. A study of 7,324 cases in Wuhan found just one outdoor transmission in a case where someone had a sustained conversation with an individual who already had symptoms. A study in Ireland found the ratio to be 1 in 1,000.
Now extrapolate the statistical anomaly of outdoor transmission to children who are not exhibiting symptoms for a virus that doesn’t even meaningfully affect them, and we are still making them wear masks in the summer heat without any evidence that masks work even indoors.
Fair use excerpt. Read the rest here.
