This is prompted by our Commissioner of Health saying last week that masks definitely work. Well let’s see. Here is a chart showing the date the mandate was enacted. At that time the state first said it would take two weeks to work, but later amended that to four weeks. So we labeled four weeks later, see the big drop? Me either. See the huge spike while mask wearing was 90% plus. And then there is the date the mandate finally expired. Kind of ironic how the mask mandate didn’t work to reduce cases until the mandate was ended, or is that paradoxical? You will note that at no time during the mandate were cases ever lower than before the mandate. And as I constantly said, what really matters is mask wearing. Throughout this period Minnesota had one of the highest mask-wearing rates in the nation, most of the time over 90%. Yeah those masks worked great, as virus collection devices. Thanks to Dave Dixon for putting the chart together.
The Healthy Skeptic is a website about the health care system, and is written by Kevin Roche, who has many years of experience working in the health industry. Mr. Roche is available to assist health care companies through consulting arrangements through Roche Consulting, LLC and may be reached at 
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Mask mandates have nothing to do with attenuating the spread of C19; rather, they are about leftists subjugating conservatives, libertarians, and moderates into the notion that we “are in this together,” that “we are responsible for each other,” and that “the wearer is responsible for the health of others.” Nonsense. Cloth and regular masks do nothing to protect the wearer or others. Do you “believe” in masks? Fine! Get yourself an N95 to protect YOURSELF – take PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY – and leave the rest of us alone. Take responsibility for yourself, and leave those of us who understand data analysis (like the data Mr. Roche presents above) alone.
This weekend I was invited to give a lecture to dozens of mostly academic physicians. I’d bet 100% were vaccinated, and none would be there had they symptoms. I was appalled when I walked in the room. My entire audience was wearing masks! I thought to myself, “Why bother to present data on my topic? These folks obviously can’t understand data analysis anyway!”
“Mommy,” said the young lad, “What is hypocrisy?” His mom replied, “Hypocrisy is when the same people claim that health care is a basic human right, but that the unvaccinated should be denied health care. And when people justify abortion because ‘My body, my choice!” but the same people insist that the Federal government has the right to force vaccinations via an OSHA mandate.”
Go figure.