Media ask pandemic architect how to ‘get beyond’ science on masks

As mask mandates are reinstated by universities, hospitals, and other institutions, media and public health operatives are attempting to discredit large studies showing masks to be ineffective at stopping COVID-19.

CNN host Michael Smerconish Sunday asked former National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Dr. Anthony Fauci how to “get beyond” a meta-study from the Cochrane Institute, an international provider of quality medical reviews.

The study’s researchers reviewed 78 global studies involving over 600,000 people. Significantly, the studies they looked at were randomized controlled trial (RCT) studies, which are considered to be high-quality research and the scientific optimum. They concluded that medical/surgical cloth masks and N95/P2 respirators “make little to no difference in how many people caught a flu‐like illness/COVID‐like illness.”

“There is just no evidence that they make any difference,” lead researcher and Oxford University Senior Associate Tutor Dr. Tom Jefferson, MD told reporter Maryanne Demasi in a February interview. “Full stop. My job, our job as a review team, was to look at the evidence, we have done that. Not just for masks. We looked at hand washing, sterilisation, goggles etcetera . . .”

Furthermore, given that there have been no RCT studies showing masks to be seriously effective, Dr. Jefferson emphasized that policymakers who instituted mask mandates “were convinced by nonrandomized studies, flawed observational studies.”

CNN’s Smerconish asked Fauci Sunday about the Cochrane study and Dr. Jefferson’s remarks.

“How do we get beyond that finding of that particular review?” ask Smerconish.

Fauci answered that “there are other studies” and that the data are different “on an individual basis.”

“Yeah but there are other studies,” Fauci replied. “When you’re talking about the effect on the epidemic or the pandemic as a whole, the data are less strong. But when you talk about as an individual basis of someone protecting themselves or protecting themselves from spreading it to others, there’s no doubt that there’s many studies that show that there is an advantage.”

“When you [look] at the broad population level like the Cochrane study, the data are less firm with regard to the effect on the overall pandemic,” Fauci added. “But we’re not talking about that, we’re talking about an individual’s effect on their own safety. That’s a bit different than the broad population level.”

Many netizens expressed confusion at Fauci’s remarks, asking why the former presidential chief medical advisor would reference “other studies” which are nonrandomized and of poor quality when they have long been dismissed by medical experts.

In addition to Dr. Jefferson, University of California San Francisco Epidemiology and Biostatistics Professor Vinay Prasad, who calls mask-wearing “a bizarre way to treat anxiety,” previously slammed the CDC’s research finding masks effective as “hairdresser anecdotes.” Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo similarly criticized it as “shaky studies” based on “shaky methods.”