Mandatory Mask Use Could Have Saved 40,000 Lives, Study Says
Mandatory Mask Use Could Have Saved 40,000 Lives, Study Says
Statistical analysis shows that personal choices alone don’t defeat Covid-19.
By Peter Coy at Bloomberg
July 16, 2020, 6:00 AM EDT
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-07-16/mandatory-mask-use-could-have-saved-40-000-lives-study-says?srnd=premium
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It’s clear by now that face masks save lives by hindering the spread of Covid-19. But some people continue to argue that mask mandates are intrusive and unnecessary because most people can be counted on to do the right thing for their own and their families’ safety.
In fact, mandates are essential, a new study finds. Using statistical analysis, it concludes that 40,000 lives would have been saved in two months if a national mask mandate for employees of public-facing businesses had gone into effect on April 1 and had been strictly obeyed. The analysis was for the months of April and May; presumably even more lives would have been saved if a mandate had been in place up to the present.
The study is by Victor Chernozhukov of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Hiroyuki Kasahara and Paul Schrimpf of the University of British Columbia’s Vancouver School of Economics. It was published online on July 7 by the Center for Economic Policy Research.
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To measure the effectiveness of mandates, Chernozhukov and his co-authors compared death rates from the virus in places that mandated masks early vs. places that imposed mandates later or not at all. They controlled for other factors that contribute to the lethality of the virus, such as density and the age and health of the population, other government mandates, and changes in behavior. They found that mask mandates had a strong impact over and above the effects of voluntary and involuntary changes in behavior such as social distancing.
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