[Monticore]

Originally Posted by Bearcat

Sure, but the messaging of "they won't help you anyway, but they do help the healthcare workers who need them" just didn't work well, IMO.

Say they're effective, and people hoard. Say "save them for the healthcare workers", people hoard. Say they aren't effective, the people who don't want to wear them will cling to the statement for eternity.

Maybe something along the lines of "right now, there are several other ways to prevent the spread, which are just as effective... social distancing, no large groups, etc" ...maybe that would have gotten the point across without the contradiction.

But, that's all in hindsight, of course... trying to get the point across perfectly to 300 million people in order to do the right thing at the time, but another right thing later, all with limited and ever-changing information, isn't easy.

Research on masks on an individual basis at the time in regards to the viruses we knew about did show that they could cause more harm that good, so it wasn’t completely misleading.