printSome clear thinking to counter incessant, statist propaganda against respirators is needed.
The State and its agents, in our highly centralized healthcare system, categorically doesn’t want the citizen to purchase “face masks,” the surgeon general’s term, not mine.
Hence the incessant, neurotic, total discrediting of N95 filtering facepiece respirators, which, by the CDC’s own account, can be protective.
Logic says the respirator is better than nothing and may indeed be protective. Here’s why:
While the virus is indeed minuscule, COVID-19 is delivered in a larger medium of bodily fluids or spray. In other words, some barrier to the medium in which the Corona Virus is delivered is better than none.
The CDC asks and answers the following question:
What makes N95 respirators different from facemasks (sometimes called a surgical mask)?
Understanding the difference between surgical masks and N95 respirators:
N95 respirators reduce the wearer’s exposure to airborne particles, from small particle aerosols to large droplets. N95 respirators are tight-fitting respirators that filter out at least 95% of particles in the air, including large and small particles. … These respirators filter out at least 95% of very small (0.3 micron) particles. N95 filtering facepiece respirators are capable of filtering out all types of particles, including bacteria and viruses.
In the service of honesty, state apparatchiks (CDC, included) might make an honest appeal to consumers on the grounds of dire shortages.
But on the grounds that no protection is better than some protection? You gotta be stupid to fail to dissect that bit of disinformation, repeated ad nauseam by the healthcare automatons.
* Image of a N95 Respirator courtesy CDC
Of interest:
“Surgical Masks vs. Respirators”
The Economist: “Diagnosis: opaque: Donald Trump wants hospitals to be more upfront about prices“