A friend of mine made a very convincing case on LessWrong for widespread usage of high quality masks. I am reposting here because we expect greater knowledge of affecting change through public health campaigns etc.:
"Surgical masks do not form an airtight seal to the face and thus can't reliably prevent transmission. Achieving a tight fit with FFP masks is tricky and at least requires some practice. A recent post on LessWrong suggested the use of reusable masks with replaceable filters and body made out of silicone..."
"These masks (also sometimes called respirators) are available in different sizes and can be equipped with filters of N99 / P3 standard. Safe usage should be much easier to achieve than with FFP masks due to the mask body having a flexible silicone edge that can form a tight seal with the face. [...] They are more expensive than the other mask types (~50$), but can be easily mass-produced using injection molding. Thus, widespread use of such masks seems highly desirable and might play a big part in reducing effective transmission rates without requiring severe social-distancing measures. Compared to the economic costs of these measures, the cost of providing these masks to everyone, at least in industrialized countries, seems to be negligible. "
Call to action
"Given the plausibility and potential benefit of the idea described above, it is urgent that we take action to promote it or figure out if it is wrong. I strongly encourage the readers of this post to:
- Share the idea widely and try to convince influential people.
- Buy a mask for yourself, friends, and family; wear them when you're in public (or generally close to people that you don't live with) to protect yourself and others and increase social acceptance.
- Use 3D printers and share potential designs; distribute self-made masks to people in need of protective equipment.
- Reach out to groups which are at high risk of infections and with an interest in protecting themselves (e.g. nurses in nursing homes).
- Suggest further ideas and point out potential problems in the comments."
I think the idea of effective mask use has withstood sufficient criticism to warrant spreading aggressively, both to the public as well as experts in the field. It may be a mistake, but compared to no mask at all (risk of infection, barriers to reentering society) it is hard to see it being a significant mistake. The potential upside is significant. We may have a relatively cheap and safe countermeasure within reach.
I didn't vote either way, but I'm sympathetic to Hauke's view because I think some EAs are distracted by COVID-19 stuff that they don't have a lot of expertise right now when they could be doing higher impact work.
(There are also some EAs who should be working on COVOD-19! I'm just not sure what the balance is.)
EDIT: Okay, if I'm honest, it's because I keep getting distracted by COVID-19 volunteer efforts when I would have more impact focusing on my job.
Hauke, have you written up a postmortem somewhere that I can find? Here's one by David Manheim if you happen to need a template.
Point 2 is fair, but do note that I did post this under question, so some degree of uncertainty is implied.
Point 3 seems like addressing a standard that is at the very least not consistently applied. I went back through all question posts of the last 6 months; this seems to be fairly similar in form to this question and does not contain a cost-benefit analysis either. And as already mentioned, it is still part of the question category.
1) I was aware of this podcast, and actually contemplated not posting because the superficial similarity between the topics might be a problem. First of all Lewis' criticism is not just slightly different, it's all about EA's discussion of cloth masks. About medical masks, which this post is about, he specifically says "medical masks are pretty good for the general population which I’ll just about lean in favor of, although all of these things are uncertain.". Furthermore I am uncertain whether one very recent expert's opinion should promote a huge shift in EA's consensus on this topic.
Well, when comparing a typical price for these masks (was ~50$, nowadays they are mostly sold out) times number of people with the damage to the economy caused by lockdowns and social distancing, you don't relly need a calculator, do you? :)
I've also pointed out that they can be mass-produced, so distributing mask to everyone, at least in industrialized countries, should obviously be cost-effective.
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