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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Everything seems normal at my kids' schools.  Also did you guys see the NYT piece that seemingly concludes that all the COVID mitigation measures may have had very little impact?  Comparing outcomes in mega-masking/lifestyle limiting states compared to those that went back to normal sooner.

Did Omicron spread less in the parts of the U.S. where social distancing and masking were more common?

The answer is surprisingly unclear.

Nationwide, the number of official Covid cases has recently been somewhat higher in heavily Democratic areas than Republican areas, according to The Times’s data. That comparison doesn’t fully answer the question, though, because Democratic areas were also conducting more tests, and the percentage of positive tests tended to be somewhat higher in Republican areas.

No single statistic offers a definitive answer. When I look at all the evidence, I emerge thinking that liberal areas probably had slightly lower Omicron infection rates than conservative areas. But it is difficult to be sure, as these state-level charts — by my colleague Ashley Wu — suggest.
The lack of a clear pattern is itself striking. Remember, not only have Democratic voters been avoiding restaurants and wearing masks; they are also much more likely to be vaccinated and boosted (and vaccines substantially reduce the chances of infection). Combined, these factors seem as if they should have caused large differences in case rates.

They have not. And that they haven’t offers some clarity about the relative effectiveness of different Covid interventions.[/quote]

I would be interested in a link.  I can't find the article.

I have wondered all along if this would prove to be true.  It's very human-like to think we can control the outcomes of everything.[/quote]

Not to "well, actually" you, but, well, actually:

The CDC released a study yesterday showing that in Arkansas, the schools that had a mask requirement had a 23% lower infection than other Arkansas schools that had no masking requirement.  Which is a significant difference, contrary to what PP indicates above.  [url]https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7110e1.htm?s_cid=mm7110e1_x[/url]

[quote]During August–October 2021, public school districts in Arkansas with full or partial mask requirements had lower incidences of COVID-19 among students and staff members than did districts without mask requirements. Strengths of this investigation include the use of multiple analyses, and sensitivity analyses, with the protective effect of mask use holding across all analyses, including within districts that switched from no mask policy to any mask policy during the investigation period. Universal mask use, in coordination with other prevention strategies such as vaccination of students and staff members in K–12 schools, remains an important tool for preventing SARS-CoV-2 transmission.[google]

Seems like masks actually do help prevent transmission in schools, and that contrary to what folks here have been saying, states down south which did not have mask requirements earlier in the pandemic actually did feel the results of their policies in their student and teacher infection numbers.  But go off on how they're not an effective tool for containing the virus, that's fine.[/quote]

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