Coronavirus

[Cigarbutt]

^An aspect (positive or negative) of mask wearing is related to signaling. But what is the signal?

My softball season has been modified (delayed, some new rules etc) and the risk-reward disease aspect has been efficiently integrated. Players don't wear masks and continue to spit. An interesting change is that the home base umpire (umpire typically have risk factors for covid) now stands behind the fence, at a reasonable distance. The catcher continues to wear a mask and this is not seen as a sign of weakness or control, at least for the very large majority.

Community mask use in North America has increased significantly during 2020 and there has been some convergence in use concerning differentiation factors (ideological affiliation, education, age, urban vs rural etc).

i continue to have doubts about masks under various scenarios but have no problems with public mandates. The risk-reward related to the inconvenience and very low cost seems to be a no-brainer. However, i've noticed that people who refuse to wear masks for ideological reasons tend to (correlation) wear a virtual one in front of their eyes when uncomfortable objective data is presented.

[JRM]

Cigarbutt, I agree.  I'm not an anti-masker.  I just think it's silly when somebody is talking into a camera, and there is clearly nobody else nearby, and they're wearing a mask.  My town has had a mask mandate, and there has been drastically less cases in my city compared to other cities in the state.  There was a mild outbreak when college students came back.  Then the university implemented a mask mandate, and cases started trending down again.  Very anecdotal, but it seems to work.

[clutch]

If they want to signal things, they should be signaling the correct use of masks.

Then there is Biden who pulled down his mask to cough into his hands. (Don't take this as political bashing, just venting about fake virtue signaling)

https://twitter.com/drdavidsamadi/status/1314888798489190403?s=20

[Cigarbutt]

If they want to signal things, they should be signaling the correct use of masks.
Then there is Biden who pulled down his mask to cough into his hands. (Don't take this as political bashing, just venting about fake virtue signaling)
https://twitter.com/drdavidsamadi/status/1314888798489190403?s=20

When observing people wearing masks, the frequency of technical errors is quite high. One has to wonder if that's related to distraction or habit. Pretending to believe in masks may play a role.
Early on in the pandemic, there was this video that is interesting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AL9ru777zBI
@clutch
i can't resist to mention that, by denouncing fake virtue signaling, you are, by definition, virtue signaling yourself. 
On this topic, can we say masks are filters and call it a day?

[Investor20]

https://www.who.int/influenza/publications/public_health_measures/publication/en/
G  L  O  B  A  L     I  N  F  L  U  E  N  Z  A     P  R  O  G  R  A  M  M  E
Non-pharmaceuticalpublic health measures for mitigating the risk and impact of epidemic and pandemic influenza
You have to download the PDF document.

Quoting from this document: (NPI: Non pharmaceutical intervention)

Page 2:

"There have been a number of high-quality randomized controlled trials (RCTs) demonstrating that personal protective measures such as hand hygiene and face masks have, at best, a small effect on influenza transmission, although higher compliance in a severe pandemic might improve effectiveness."
........
Page 26
OVERALL RESULT OF EVIDENCE ON FACE MASKS: Ten RCTs were included in the meta-analysis, and there was no evidence that face masks are effective in reducing transmission of laboratory-confirmed influenza.

[clutch]

If they want to signal things, they should be signaling the correct use of masks.
Then there is Biden who pulled down his mask to cough into his hands. (Don't take this as political bashing, just venting about fake virtue signaling)
https://twitter.com/drdavidsamadi/status/1314888798489190403?s=20

When observing people wearing masks, the frequency of technical errors is quite high. One has to wonder if that's related to distraction or habit. Pretending to believe in masks may play a role.
Early on in the pandemic, there was this video that is interesting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AL9ru777zBI
@clutch
i can't resist to mention that, by denouncing fake virtue signaling, you are, by definition, virtue signaling yourself. 
On this topic, can we say masks are filters and call it a day?

Lol I guess we can't resist virtue signaling one way or the other. I'm also all for wearing masks as much as possible BTW.

[KCLarkin]

"There have been a number of high-quality randomized controlled trials (RCTs) demonstrating that personal protective measures such as hand hygiene and face masks have, at best, a small effect on influenza transmission, although higher compliance in a severe pandemic might improve effectiveness."

The problem with the old, pre-Covid RCTs is compliance. You can give masks to kids in a dorm, but they are unlikely to wear them if the risk is small (e.g. seasonal flu) and there is no culture of mask wearing.

But when compliance is high, evidence suggests they are effective. One of the referenced studies:

In 154 households in which interventions were implemented within 36 hours of symptom onset in the index patient, transmission of RT-PCR-confirmed infection seemed reduced, an effect attributable to fewer infections among participants using facemasks plus hand hygiene (adjusted odds ratio, 0.33 [95% CI, 0.13 to 0.87]).

[muscleman]

Anybody tracking mRNA's vaccine trial enrollment rates? I am pretty upset that they used to enroll 4-5k patients per week but has been super slow since mid September. It is down to 2k a week and then 1k a week.
https://www.modernatx.com/cove-study
With nearly 3 million volunteers signed up for COVID vaccine trials, I don't understand why this is the case except for intentional delays.

[Cigarbutt]

"There have been a number of high-quality randomized controlled trials (RCTs) demonstrating that personal protective measures such as hand hygiene and face masks have, at best, a small effect on influenza transmission, although higher compliance in a severe pandemic might improve effectiveness."

The problem with the old, pre-Covid RCTs is compliance. You can give masks to kids in a dorm, but they are unlikely to wear them if the risk is small (e.g. seasonal flu) and there is no culture of mask wearing.
But when compliance is high, evidence suggests they are effective. One of the referenced studies:

In 154 households in which interventions were implemented within 36 hours of symptom onset in the index patient, transmission of RT-PCR-confirmed infection seemed reduced, an effect attributable to fewer infections among participants using facemasks plus hand hygiene (adjusted odds ratio, 0.33 [95% CI, 0.13 to 0.87]).

There is also the possibility that, on top of lower transmission, the severity of disease transfer is less because of lower viral loads. There are some data and conceptual reasons behind this hypothesis.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2026913
Another data point is the fact that frontline healthcare workers working in high risk areas (concentrated active cases shedding virus and high-risk procedures for droplets and aerosols) and equipped with appropriate for risk equipment did not, at least on a large scale, develop disease as a result of nosocomial transmission.

Anybody tracking mRNA's vaccine trial enrollment rates? I am pretty upset that they used to enroll 4-5k patients per week but has been super slow since mid September. It is down to 2k a week and then 1k a week.
https://www.modernatx.com/cove-study
With nearly 3 million volunteers signed up for COVID vaccine trials, I don't understand why this is the case except for intentional delays.

i assume your thesis is that there is some kind of conspiracy going on to avoid meeting certain deadlines?
A few observations:
-Moderna is very highly motivated (too much?) to meet deadlines
-Moderna was looking for 30k 'volunteers' by September and adjusted their protocol of selection to better reflect the underlying population
-Without going into controversial issues, there are understandable reasons why certain communities may not volunteer as much because of a deficit in trust
-----
For those interested, concerning the vaccines, health disparities and especially excess mortality, JAMA has recently released (especially the October 12 issues) many interesting and impactful studies and commentaries.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/newonline

[Spekulatius]

^ Interesting papers. The paper below seems to indicate that excess death were somewhat undercounted. Granted Alzheimer victims don’t have a great prognosis anyways, but still:

Excess Deaths From COVID-19 and Other Causes, March-July 2020
Steven H. Woolf, MD, MPH1; Derek A. Chapman, PhD1; Roy T. Sabo, PhD2; et al