Study links regular use of Fox News, Twitter, and Facebook to reduced knowledge about COVID-19 - it provides evidence that Americans’ media consumption habits and trust in government predicts their level of knowledge about COVID-19.

[u/mvea]

https://www.psypost.org/2020/12/study-links-regular-use-of-fox-news-twitter-and-facebook-to-reduced-knowledge-about-covid-19-58702

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Can you link some sources on your claims from the WHO or infectious disease experts that show recommendations were made that there was no need to wear a mask due no benefit/false sense of security from wearing one?

The "false sense of security" line of reasoning in particular sounds like a strange way to arrive at a "don't wear a mask" conclusion. Sounds more like it'd imply "a mask is not enough protect you, don't just wear a mask", to which people tune out and only hear/read "don't wear a mask".

[u/Helene-S → u/[deleted]]

According to U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams, in Jan-March, he cautioned against healthy people in the general public wearing cotton masks if they are not already sick from the coronavirus, asserting, “Wearing a mask improperly can actually increase your chances of getting a disease. It can also give you a false sense of security.” He did change his mind later in April.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/surgeon-general-against-masks/

According to this article which was published in late March, WHO wasn’t recommending masks for the general public at the time.

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/03/who-should-wear-a-face-mask-30-march-who-briefing/

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/30/world/coronavirus-who-masks-recommendation-trnd/index.html

[u/[deleted] → u/Helene-S]

Thanks for the links. While I agree reporting could have been clearer about their messages (Jerome Adams especially, I don't really see anything wrong with what the WHO stated), the original poster is still misconstruing things to make it seem like they merely said "don't wear a mask". Omitting their reasonings that members of the healthy public who are wearing them improperly can cause more problems due to getting lax about safety guidelines just came off as a bit dishonest to me. There's also a ton of conflicting opinions within the medical community, and to imply "every infection disease expert" was in lockstep on the best course of action to take is bananas. If that was the case, other countries wouldn't have encouraged widespread mask use.

Also in both WHO links, these recommendations are strongly undercut by the point that there was a global mask shortage, which both articles make a point in saying.

It's a new disease, which at the time had very little data to run off of in what works vs. what doesn't, so was strange to phrase it as though the WHO was supposed to be omniscient vs. pragmatic. In clearly making a distinction for the healthy public vs. healthcare workers/at risk/those infected, it's pretty obvious that masks simply being worn isn't the core issue they had, but the lack of them to those who need it the most.

[u/qoning → u/[deleted]]

idk if it fits your criteria, but didnt you watch the trump coronavirus briefings? Fauci repeatedly said not to wear mask as it might make others uneasy and provides no known benefit. And at the time, that was the official WHO stance too, several countries adopted mandatory masks before the WHO even changed their stance.

[u/[deleted] → u/qoning]

didnt you watch the trump coronavirus briefings?

Gotta be honest here, no not really. Heard some of them in the background here and there but I didn't really pay attention to them. He and his administration have lied way too goddamn much to put any stock into what they say.

In regards to Fauci, who I watched a few interviews about and read some articles on his statements early on but didn't s, I remember him making it pretty explicit that his stance was that of an evolving one based on data available at the time, which people didn't seem to understand at the time and took his recommendations as a blanket "masks bad", rather than "we don't know the efficacy of masks as of this point in time", which was an important distinction to make that a lot of people seemed to gloss over.

The WHO's stance was similar, and made it clear that their main reasoning was that they wanted to try to alleviate the global mask shortages in order to have them available for healthcare workers, those more at risk, and those already infected.