Right now there are 1692 active COVID cases in Alberta, about .03% of the population.
I'm curious as to what your opinion is, what amount of cases would this need to go down to before you would be comfortable giving up masks?
Posted Sep 9, 2020, 8:50 PM UTC
A proven vaccine.
I hope this become socially acceptable and encouraged that when people have a general cold where they are coughing/sneezing, that they wear a mask. Nothing worse than somebody on the train/office that are spreading their disgustingness everywhere.
Yeah I like this, in Japan if you are feeling sick it's courtesy to wear a mask in public.
As long as they don’t drop down the mask to cough or sneeze then put it back up. (Yes, I’ve seen this happen many times and it just makes me shake my head).
"I'm curious as to what your opinion is, what amount of cases would this need to go down to before you would be comfortable giving up masks?"
Who said we were uncomfortable going maskless?
I think for a lot of people the "comfort" number is higher than what we currently have. For me, I think if 10% of the population had it then I would mask up and be more agreeable to lockdown restrictions.
I don't find masks to be all that intrusive, personally. Kind of blows my mind how much people lose their minds over it. So I'm good keeping things masked until a vaccine is available and has had at least a couple weeks of availability to the masses.
A scientifically proven vaccine, and good/routine/ knowledgable treatment in hospitals. I'd like them to know more about covid and long term effects. Basically until this because as routine for us as the flu or any other disease that the medical community has been dealing with for a long time I think masks are a big part of our future. This is largely because we share a large land border with the dumpster fire of north america right now. As much as I'd like to see masks become less scarce this is not an island and Canada isn't taking strict measures to prevent spread like other countries are.
We could also keep them forever to help save people from dying of the flu.
-2000, answering for most people in this sub.
Maybe 25-50 a day or less ?
For the wife and I, masks until there is a proven effective vaccine. Trust me, I was terribly sick for 3 and a half months, and still have the odd symptom pop up. You do not want me not wearing a mask in public, as I believe I could still pass it on to you, even though I have done quarantine time twice, and my doctor cleared me to roam freely.
You're asking the wrong question to the wrong people.
The number of cases isn't as important as where infections are happening. People in Calgary, Alberta, and even Canada have never been catching any infections in public places. You can look for yourself and see that customer infections in public places are so rare as to be non-existent. Source and CTV article explaining it (note that you need to read past the headline to see that those 500 cases out of about 15,000 in that time period are not related to customers where the mask bylaw applies, it is either exempt locations or employees infecting each other). Another link from BC where they break down the source of cases.
According to Dr. Henry’s rough breakdown, about a third of B.C.’s new cases are related to house parties or nightclubs, bars or restaurants. Another third come from people getting infected by family or friends, she said. And the rest come from workplace clusters, outbreaks in the nursing-home sector, or domestic and international travel.
Those numbers are without mask mandates.
I would personally feel comfortable if cases weren't growing exponentially and the chance of meeting any person in public with covid would be less than about 1/1000. That would be equate to about 1400 new transmissions per day in Calgary. More importantly, I would need to see any evidence that community transmission in places the mandate applies are happening at all. The number for community transmission is currently about 0, and has been like that since distancing started and stores put up plexiglass long before the mask mandate. Mandatory masks in every public space have done nothing to prevent transmission so at this point the bylaw seems entirely useless. We get all of the downsides with verifiable data that it hasn't prevented any infections.
Now, if it was to apply any time you were in any of these situations: haircut, bus, taxi, uber, elevator, airplane, or any other situation where you can't maintain distance for any extended length of time, I would be completely in favor of mandatory masks.
Agreed.
Im not super picky about it right now, it probably will never be eradictated. So maybe when people know how to deal with it more accordingly?? And are used Its new, we dont know how it behaves, we dont really have a treatment . I think masks are thing todo until we find a treatment ECT.
I don't want to wear one now. Great question though. We have absolutely no choice in the matter. It doesn't matter if/when WE are comfortable or not. We have to wear them until we're told we can stop.
The trajectory is most relevant. When we have an R of about 0.5 and the cases are contracting at a rapid pace I would support repealing of masks in a staged approach. Absolute number of cases isnt relevant unless its so low to be pointless. AB was <30 cases a day a few months ago, now its 160. Viral spread is handing out a death sentence or two a day. As far as I am concerned, we should be taking what reasonable measures we can (social distancing), and all measures that provide no detriment are a no brainer. Masks are one of those.
If I was on a boat, I wouldnt care how flooded it was, even if 0.03%, Id want to know if we are taking on water so to speak.
We will have more pandemics, and they may be more deadly. Now is a good time to figure out our modern defenses. At mininum, these things are worth trying to completion. That being said, I cannot fathom what bugs people about masks, so maybe I just dont get what the fuss is.
Not going to happen till we have beat this thing back. So the end will be vaccinations are wide spread, and the world is getting back to normal.
I give it over a year or more till things get taken care of and that’s if the vaccine works well. We know some work with out killing people but what long term effectiveness is still not known.
We are using mask to get back to a new normal as it’s one of the few tools we have.
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are we going to mask up every flu season then?
I think that's a fantastic idea. Even if I don't catch the flu every year, my kid brings home a cold every month. If I could reduce that to every 3 months, awesome.
If the flu season can overwhelm our health system, I would say yes. The only reason things are not bad at the moment is the restrictions in place are slowing the spread. Once the ICU fills up the death rate skyrockets, we need to keep our health workers from burning out and elective surgeries going.
It is possible this could be a long term thing but that’s a nightmare senecio
Me? Never.
I would say when there's a reliable vaccine administered to the majority of the population
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I’d be comfortable now honestly, but that’s definitely the wrong answer since it’s really not about keeping me safe. I am wearing one when I go out, so there’s that at least.
As for when they won’t be considered mandatory, that’s going. To be a really tough one. For starters, a downward trend will need to be established for a good length of time; maybe a month or two at the absolute least. The last thing council would want to do is to declare masks no longer mandatory and have cases shoot up again and have to reverse course.
Love it or not, masks are here to stay for the foreseeable future.
Username checks out. Dude just wants all our masks. Don't let him.
The issue is less about percent active, and more about living in an urban center in the midst of a pandemic without the benefit of a vaccine.
This pandemic started with one person. And for the time being, COVID spread has been mitigated with behavior and caution. So we can't relax until we reach herd immediately from vaccines.
For example, if each person infects 2 people. After 20 infection cycles, you'll have over a million infections.
Bottom line - it's less about percent active rates, and more about maintaining protocols until a vaccine is available.
Ok but if .03% of the population has it...is it a pandemic?
Whether or not a virus becomes a pandemic isn't related to numbers, it's related to the characteristics of the virus. And each virus behaves differently.
SARS was very deadly and was only contagious after people became symptomatic. So it was easier to stop - because infected patients died at a high rate - and when you're dead, you don't spread. And asymptomatic individuals didn't spread to others. Only 8000 people world-wide died from SARS.
COVID-19 sucks, because asymptomatic infected individuals can go around for days or over a week infecting other people before they realize they are sick. And if you do get infected - you are less likely to die, and can continue to infect others. It also spreads easily through airborne droplets in confined indoor spaces.
So if you take 2 urban centers of 1 million - and drop a SARS patient in City A and COVID-19 patient in City B, and start the clock, COVID-19 will rapidly spread like wildfire throughout the population in City B compared to SARS.
Even though SARS is more likely to kill you - few people actually get infected. Whereas COVID-19 can really spread and infect a LOT of people - and in the end - way more people will die. We're approaching a million global deaths by COVID-19.
So - that's why we need to maintain tight infection control until there's a vaccine. As soon as we say "meh - there's not many cases" "let's go back to normal", then infections will take off.
Calgary seems to be starting to slack off now? Hard to tell if social media is a true reflection of reality. Lots of Calgary anti-maskers on Twitter and Facebook. So we'll see whether there's a spike in a few weeks. If there is - you can thank them.
Wearing a mask isn’t to protect yourself, it’s to protect others.
I won’t stop wearing a mask until I could guarantee I will not be the one to spread the disease.
I am blessed with tough skin so wearing a mask on my face doesn’t bother me, so for me, it’s a non issue to keep wearing it until we’ve completed stopped the spread.
What are your thoughts on continuing mask use forever for flu protection? That could make a huge dent in flue season/deaths.
Absolutely.
It would be great if anyone who was experiencing minor seasonal flu symptoms felt confident enough to put on a mask before going out in public to stop the spread.
Wouldn't that be the smart thing to do? I mean, less sick time every winter, better for the economy? If less adults get sick, less babies and kids spreading common colds at daycares?
You'll never completely stop the spread.
Perhaps, all we can do is try.
Yes - who was suggesting not to try?
There's a big difference between elimination and eradication.
Well luckily wearing a mask isn’t a big deal because if we never stop the spread, we’ll never stop wearing masks.