I agree. The public covid protocols were just to make the public feel safe but in reality it made no difference, getting away from covid is like getting away from flu.
Initially, back in Mar 2020, when we had scant data all the extreme measures were justified, but once the data started coming in, the world should have gone back to normal 1.5 yr ago. Just like everyone else, I was struggling to find info on my own, but one day at work, we had an issue with a batch of wafer and I happened to run into the fab's pump shop guys. They were called in to repair a chamber pump. We started talking and our casual conversation turned to the COVID response. For the next hour, I learned about particle sizes, masks, cleanroom and surgery room attire, what works and does not, and essentially those guys just laughed off the masks that our medical leaders were espousing. The cheapo masks does reduce particle travel distance but since people still congregate, the air currents produce by moving humans carries the COVID virus from person to person anyway. Same for those stupid partitions at our desks. The HVAC system carries everything all over. The bottom line is that if we really want to stop and kill the virus, literally everyone has to be quarantined in his/her own box, which is impossible, and if we allow people to congregate, everyone would have to dress in %100 cleanroom attire which is what surgeons wear.
China is not stopping the virus with these draconian policies.
What do you mean the mask doesn't work? My whole department(anesthesiology) was working with covid patients for 2 years. Those who religiously wore masks remained infection free.
We saw scores of people die in front of us.
Buddy, we were told to wear masks of cloths and even tissue paper. The masks that your dept had were probably medical grade which was not what are selling in the markets.