Connect with us
[bsa_pro_ad_space id=12]

COVID-19

“I want to apologize for advocating for the use of masks” – Spread of respiratory illnesses not slowed down by mask use

Published

7 minute read

The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews has released a comprehensive study of Physical interventions to interrupt or reduce the spread of respiratory viruses.  

The study examines the effectiveness of masks and of following a hand hygiene program in reducing the likelihood of acquiring respiratory virus infections such as COVID-19.

British Health Researcher Dr. John Campbell shares the disappointing results in this presentation:

From Dr. John Campbell

 

From the Cochrane Library

What did we do?
We searched for randomised controlled studies that looked at physical measures to stop people acquiring a respiratory virus infection.

We were interested in how many people in the studies caught a respiratory virus infection, and whether the physical measures had any unwanted effects.

What did we find?
We identified 78 relevant studies. They took place in low‐, middle‐, and high‐income countries worldwide: in hospitals, schools, homes, offices, childcare centres, and communities during non‐epidemic influenza periods, the global H1N1 influenza pandemic in 2009, epidemic influenza seasons up to 2016, and during the COVID‐19 pandemic. We identified five ongoing, unpublished studies; two of them evaluate masks in COVID‐19. Five trials were funded by government and pharmaceutical companies, and nine trials were funded by pharmaceutical companies.

We assessed the effects of:

· medical or surgical masks;

· N95/P2 respirators (close‐fitting masks that filter the air breathed in, more commonly used by healthcare workers than the general public); and

· hand hygiene (hand‐washing and using hand sanitiser).

We obtained the following results:

Medical or surgical masks

Ten studies took place in the community, and two studies in healthcare workers. Compared with wearing no mask in the community studies only, wearing a mask may make little to no difference in how many people caught a flu‐like illness/COVID‐like illness (9 studies; 276,917 people); and probably makes little or no difference in how many people have flu/COVID confirmed by a laboratory test (6 studies; 13,919 people). Unwanted effects were rarely reported; discomfort was mentioned.

N95/P2 respirators

Four studies were in healthcare workers, and one small study was in the community. Compared with wearing medical or surgical masks, wearing N95/P2 respirators probably makes little to no difference in how many people have confirmed flu (5 studies; 8407 people); and may make little to no difference in how many people catch a flu‐like illness (5 studies; 8407 people), or respiratory illness (3 studies; 7799 people). Unwanted effects were not well‐reported; discomfort was mentioned.

Hand hygiene

Following a hand hygiene programme may reduce the number of people who catch a respiratory or flu‐like illness, or have confirmed flu, compared with people not following such a programme (19 studies; 71,210 people), although this effect was not confirmed as statistically significant reduction when ILI and laboratory‐confirmed ILI were analysed separately. Few studies measured unwanted effects; skin irritation in people using hand sanitiser was mentioned.

 


Dr. John Campbells presentation notes with links:

RCTs did not show a clear reduction in respiratory viral infection with the use of medical/surgical masks.

There were no clear differences between the use of medical/surgical masks compared with N95/P2 respirators in healthcare workers, when used in routine care to reduce respiratory viral infection.

Do physical measures such as hand-washing or wearing masks stop or slow down the spread of respiratory viruses?

https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/…

Evidence published up to October 2022.

Background Influenza (H1N1) caused by the H1N1pdm09 virus in 2009

Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in 2003 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Update of a Cochrane Review last published in 2020.

We include results from studies from the current COVID-19 pandemic.

Main results 11 new RCTs and cluster-RCTs n = 610,872

Bringing the total number of RCTs to 78

Medical/surgical masks compared to no masks

Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of influenza‐like illness

wearing a mask may make little to no difference in how many people caught a flu-like illness/COVID-like illness

Risk ratio (RR) 0.95, (0.84 to 1.09) 9 trials, n = 276,917 participants

Moderate-certainty evidence.

Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of laboratory-confirmed influenza/SARS-CoV-2 RR 1.01, (CI 0.72 to 1.42)

6 trials, n = 13,919 Moderate-certainty evidence

Harms were rarely measured and poorly reported (very low-certainty evidence).

N95/P2 respirators compared to medical/surgical masks

We pooled trials comparing N95/P2 respirators with medical/surgical masks

We are very uncertain on the effects of N95/P2 respirators compared with medical/surgical masks on the outcome of clinical respiratory illness

Compared with wearing medical or surgical masks, wearing N95/P2 respirators probably makes little to no difference in how many people have confirmed flu and may make little to no difference in how many people catch a flu-like illness, or respiratory illness.

Confirmed influenza RR 0.70, (0.45 to 1.10) N = 7,779 Very low-certainty evidence

Influenza like illness N95/P2 respirators compared with medical/surgical masks may be effective for ILI RR 0.82 N= 8,407 Low-certainty evidence

The use of a N95/P2 respirators compared to medical/surgical masks

Probably makes little or no difference for laboratory-confirmed influenza infection RR 1.10 N = 8,407 Moderate-certainty evidence

Restricting pooling to healthcare workers made no difference to the overall findings.

Harms were poorly measured and reported

Discomfort wearing medical/surgical masks or N95/P2 respirators was mentioned in several studies

Very low-certainty evidence

One new RCT Medical/surgical masks were non-inferior to N95 respirators N = 1,009 healthcare workers in four countries, providing direct care to COVID-19 patients.

After 15 years as a TV reporter with Global and CBC and as news director of RDTV in Red Deer, Duane set out on his own 2008 as a visual storyteller. During this period, he became fascinated with a burgeoning online world and how it could better serve local communities. This fascination led to Todayville, launched in 2016.

Follow Author

COVID-19

5 Stories the Media Buried This Week

Published on

The Vigilant Fox

#5 – Anthony Fauci warns: “The next outbreak will be of a respiratory disease that’s easily transmissible, that has a significant degree of morbidity and mortality.”

“What is likely to happen,” Fauci says, “is the emergence of another respiratory disease.”

“It may be another coronavirus, because we know that coronaviruses, really, mostly in bats, have the capability of binding to receptors that are in humans.”

“It could be another flu,” Fauci continued. “We’re dealing with H5N1 now, which is bird flu, which has taken the somewhat disturbing step of infecting mammals, namely cows and cats and other mammals, which means it’s adapting itself more to a human.”

“So my concern, Walter, is that whenever that happens, the next outbreak will be of a respiratory disease that’s easily transmissible, that has a significant degree of morbidity and mortality,” Fauci said.

When asked if the cuts at HHS and “our attitude towards science” are making the situation “a little bit more dangerous,” Fauci replied, “Oh, absolutely!”

VIDEO: @TheChiefNerd

 

#4 – Dr. Oz drops bombshells on the massive waste, fraud, and abuse bleeding Medicare and Medicaid.

Oz explained that people are unknowingly signed up for coverage, illegal schemes are funneling taxpayer dollars to those who aren’t eligible, and the same patient can be billed in multiple states with no federal oversight catching it.

It also turns out that 230,000 Americans were enrolled in Obamacare plans without even knowing it.

#3 – Tucker Carlson is horrified to learn that over 9 million children have already received the COVID shot—and that the injections are still happening.

His reaction at the end of this clip says it all.

VIDEO: @McCulloughFund

While you’re here, don’t forget to subscribe to get this top 10 list emailed to you each week.

 

#2 – Jenny McCarty reveals chilling encounter after speaking out on vaccine issue.

• After going public about her son’s autism and the vaccine link, Jenny McCarthy received a private visit from a man with a warning.

• He claimed to work for a top-level PR firm and said he was approached by a government agency.

• His job? To create a campaign to discredit her and label her “anti-vaccine.”

• He said he turned down the offer—because his own child had gone through the same thing.

•The man warned her that they would find someone else to do it and use the media to come after her hard.

• McCarthy was stunned and asked him to repeat everything—she said she had chills all over her body.

• When she asked why they’d attack her despite her not being anti-vaccine, he replied, “Doesn’t matter.”

• According to him, they had the media on their side and would do whatever it took to bury her message.

#1 – Billionaire Democrat donor turned DOGE ally drops bombshell and says Biden’s border policies handed $13–15 billion a year to human traffickers—and helped import future Democratic voters.

“We gave $13 to $15 billion a year to human traffickers. That’s what this system did,” Antonio Gracias lamented.

Gracias’ team combed through voter rolls in four states and uncovered thousands of non-citizens not only registered to vote, but in many cases, actually voted.

“We looked at the voter rolls in four states, and we found thousands of these people [non-citizens] on the voter rolls, and we found many of those people had voted. In one state in particular, well over a thousand voted.”

His conclusion?

“I think this [Biden’s border policy] was a move to import voters.”

VIDEO: @KanekoaTheGreat

Share


Thanks for reading! This weekly roundup takes time and care to put together—and I do my best to make it your go-to source for the stories that matter most but rarely get the attention they deserve.

If you like my work and want to support me and my family and help keep this page going strong, the most powerful thing you can do is sign up for the email list and become a paid subscriber.

Your monthly subscription goes further than you think. Thank you so much for your support.

Continue Reading

COVID-19

Maxime Bernier slams Freedom Convoy leaders’ guilty verdict, calls Canada’s justice system ‘corrupt’

Published on

From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

The leader of the People’s Party of Canada says Tamara Lich and Chris Barber were victims of a ‘political witch hunt.’

The leader of the People’s Party of Canada (PPC) ripped Thursday’s federal court ruling that found Freedom Convoy leaders Tamara Lich and Chris Barber guilty of mischief, saying the court siding with the government amounted to a “political witch hunt.”

“It is disheartening to learn that two of the heroes of the Freedom Convoy, @LichTamara and @ChrisBarber1975, have been found guilty of mischief in the longest and one of the costliest trials in Canadian history,” Maxime Bernier wrote Thursday on X.

“This clearly was a political witch hunt.”

Bernier added that in his view the reality is that Canada’s justice system is “corrupt.”

“Trudeau and his ministers who illegally invoked the Emergencies Act and violated basic rights will go unpunished,” he noted.

“Our justice system is corrupt to the bones.”

On Thursday, Justice Heather Perkins-McVey, the federal judge overseeing the mischief trial, delivered her verdict, finding both Lich and Barber guilty of mischief.

Perkins-McVey seemed to agree with the Crown’s case that Lich and Barber’s influence on the Freedom Convoy constituted public mischief but did dismiss the Crown’s Carter Application accusing Lich and Barber of conspiracy outright.

Lich and Barber both faced six charges each, those being charges of mischief, obstruction, intimidation, and counseling others to commit mischief and intimidation. After the court reconvened Thursday afternoon, Lich was acquitted of four of her six charges, with the fifth charge, counseling to commit mischief, being stayed by the judge.

As for sentencing, the court will reconvene on April 16 at 1:30 p.m. EST, at which time it will say when a date and time for sentencing will be held.

Lich and Barber both face a possible 10-year prison sentence. LifeSiteNews has reported extensively on their trial.

The Lich and Barber trial concluded in September 2024, more than a year after it began. It was only originally scheduled to last 16 days.

Lich and Barber were arrested on February 17, 2022, in Ottawa for their roles in leading the popular Freedom Convoy protest against COVID mandates. During COVID, Canadians were subjected to vaccine mandates, mask mandates, extensive lockdowns and even the closure of churches.

Despite the peaceful nature of the protest, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government invoked the Emergencies Act to clear out protesters, an action a federal judge has since said was “not justified.” During the clear-out, an elderly lady was trampled by a police horse and many who donated to the cause had their bank accounts frozen.

Continue Reading

Trending

X