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U.S. Government Proposed Manipulating CDC Guidelines to Avoid Mask Shortages: Whistleblower:
The U.S. government proposed manipulating information about whether N95 masks worked to fight the spread of coronavirus in the general public, according to Dr. Richard Bright, a whistleblower who testified publicly for the first time on Thursday. The deception was an effort to avoid shortages and keep masks available for U.S. health care workers, but likely had a ripple effect throughout the country, leaving many people to believe that all masks are useless or even harmful during a pandemic. Bright's testimony is the first confirmation from a high-ranking official that the U.S. government actively sought to distribute incorrect information about N95 masks during the covid-19 pandemic.
Dr. Bright told the House Subcommittee on Health on Thursday about his attempts to warn others in the Department of Health and Human Services about the pending shortage of masks in January and early February, just as the novel coronavirus was spreading outside of China. Bright said that officials at the meeting simply said they would change the recommendations put out by the CDC to discourage the general public from buying masks.
"I indicated we know there will be a critical shortage of these supplies. We need to do something to ramp up production," Dr. Bright, the former top vaccine specialist at HHS, said of a meeting with HHS officials on February 7.
"They indicated if we notice there is a shortage, that we will simply change the CDC guidelines to better inform people who should not be wearing those masks, so that would save those masks for our health care workers," Dr. Bright testified.
"My response was, 'I can not believe you can sit and say that with a straight face'," Bright said. "That was absurd."
[...] Dr. Bright's entire 6-hour testimony is available on YouTube, and it's quite damning.
(Score: 4, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday May 17 2020, @01:12PM (2 children)
N95 masks are not standard-wear equipment in medicine. They do not use any mask at all without reason and do not use N95 masks except when absolutely necessary. Even right now, nobody in the Mayo network wears an N95 mask unless they are actively treating a confirmed covid-19 case right at that moment. I dunno who's been filling your head with idiotic notions but you need to get yourself informed properly.
As for me? We had to take angle grinders with steel wire wheels to paint on the basement walls and masonry blades on said grinders to clean out the mortar where it had cracked a bit but not enough to get hydraulic cement in to fix the crack. That's a lot of shit you do not want in your lungs and it's several days worth of having to do it. This does not gel with being unable to work more than ten or fifteen minutes at a time in an N95 mask, so we used masks other than N95 that we could actually breathe in.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by gtomorrow on Sunday May 17 2020, @04:34PM
Regarding N95 masks not being standard equipment, that's not what Wikipedia says [wikipedia.org], although I see that's not the mask used typically. So consider me semi-corrected and better informed.
Regarding your mask-covered mug, glad to hear that you are using some kind of mask. My point was working without any mask was a bad idea, especially in your situation.
In your case maybe a nice rubber halloween mask would better...? I KID I KID! Just stay safe, okay?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 17 2020, @06:04PM
For long use, a bit of duct tape at the nose helps keep the eye protection clear.
But, a rubber mask, preferable fed from a pressure source of fresh air is best for long jobs.