It's odd to put the introduction of hand washing at hospitals in 1800s Vienna and doubt over mask effectiveness against the spread of covid19 in the same category. They seem like opposites to me.
Sure they're both going against the scientific consensus of the time but there are some key differences.
In both cases, people don't want to change their behavior, but questioning masks is on the side of doing nothing.
There are no downsides to wearing a mask. When there's a new disease and we're not sure how to slow it's progress, but we have something that might help with no downside i.e. mask wearing, might as well try it right? And in retrospect it's pretty clear it was effective.
During the pandemic, I'd rather see scientists coming up with new more effective measures than squabbling over whether the existing measures are effective.
It's odd to put the introduction of hand washing at hospitals in 1800s Vienna and doubt over mask effectiveness against the spread of covid19 in the same category. They seem like opposites to me.
Sure they're both going against the scientific consensus of the time but there are some key differences.
In both cases, people don't want to change their behavior, but questioning masks is on the side of doing nothing.
There are no downsides to wearing a mask. When there's a new disease and we're not sure how to slow it's progress, but we have something that might help with no downside i.e. mask wearing, might as well try it right? And in retrospect it's pretty clear it was effective.
During the pandemic, I'd rather see scientists coming up with new more effective measures than squabbling over whether the existing measures are effective.