I’ve listened to the “great mask debate” with bemusement at the absurdity of those demanding I wear one. First, some background.
Before working for the State Attorney I prosecuted for the old Florida Department of Professional Regulation which regulated, among other professions, physicians. I saw the frequency with which doctors make mistakes.
Among the many medical negligence cases I handled, three in particular stand out. A patient was killed at a prestigious Miami hospital when he was mistakenly injected with embalming fluid during surgery – by a professor of anesthesiology. Another involved a Palm Beach County jail inmate who died after an ER physician missed a cervical fracture that was so obvious on the X-ray that even I could see it. Then there was the surgeon in Tampa who amputated the wrong limb on two different patients. A decade earlier, during my hospital training as a Air Force medic, I observed multiple physician medication order errors.
During my service, in the winter of 1972-73, DOD ordered flu shots service wide. I participated in administering those shots to personnel on our base only to later discover the vaccine had not been properly attenuated by the manufacturer, resulting in about 75% of those we inoculated getting full-blown cases of the flu. I refrained from taking the vaccine, and simply stamped my own shot record. As Roger McGuinn said, “I saw the great blunder my teachers had made, scientific delirium madness.” I didn’t get the flu.
I have previously written that during my legal career I regularly saw “medical experts” testify under oath to diametrically opposed conclusions about the same evidence. Such disputed expertise is common in medical malpractice lawsuits. So there is ample empirical evidence that medical “science” is far from “well-settled”, and that merely because an “expert” has an MD does not make them trustworthy.
Which brings us to wearing masks. Media darling Dr. Anthony Fauci said last March it was unnecessary to wear a mask. Then he said everyone should wear one. Now he says we should all wear two masks. What will he say next? I find it impossible to take him seriously.
I mentioned earlier the absurdity of the self-appointed mask-enforcers’ demands that I wear one. During my medic training I was taught when to wear a mask, and what purpose they serve, so I’d like to hear the enforcers answer the following questions:
- If you are wearing a mask, why do I need to? Is the one you’re wearing useless? If so, then wouldn’t mine be too?
- I have taken the COVID vaccine, so why do I still need to wear a mask. Is the vaccine useless?
- If I have acquired immunity from previous exposure to the virus, am asymptomatic thus not contagious nor susceptible, why do I need a mask?
I’ve asked those questions of a couple of physicians I know, and have gotten essentially the same answer. The average person is not medically sophisticated enough to understand those nuances, so they should just wear one. In other words, we’re dumbing down public health to accommodate the “Epsilons”.
It’s like Nancy Reagan saying “Just say no!” to drugs.
Or, as H.L. Mencken said, “Complex problems have simple, easy-to-understand, wrong answers.”
Whenever I hear a “mask-enforcer” regurgitating what they’ve been told in the media about why I should wear a mask, I’m reminded of the movie Idiocracy (which is becoming more documentary than sci-fi). I guess masks “have electrolytes”.
It’s your choice to wear a mask. I respect that. “Freedom of choice” about what we do with our own bodies is a mantra we’ve been hearing for years. If I were infected with COVID, I’d stay home. Since I’m not, I’m exercising my freedom of choice about my own body by not wearing a mask. Why don’t you respect my choice?
I suspect that for mask-enforcers, it’s not about public health at all. It’s a pathological need to tell others what to do.
Gary Beatty lives between Florida and Pagosa Springs. He retired after 30 years as a prosecutor for the State of Florida, has a doctorate in law, is Board Certified in Criminal Trial law by the Florida Supreme Court, and is now a law professor.