Corky,
Regarding your #189 link.
I looked at the study.
It was a legitimate, large randomized trial in Bangladesh, but its findings were far more modest than Yale's promotional headline suggests.
The mask promotion program nearly tripled proper mask usage from about 13% to 42%, yet symptomatic, antibody-confirmed infection declined from 0.76% to 0.68%.
That is an absolute difference of only 0.08 percent or roughly eight fewer cases per 10,000 people.
Most importantly, the Cochrane review included this Bangladesh trial and still concluded that the overall randomized evidence showed little or no clearly detectable community benefit.
So yes, the Yale study is evidence of a modest possible benefit.
It is not the sweeping scientific proof of mask mandates that you are presenting it as, and it does not contradict my use of the word "minimal."
In August of 2021 my FIL was dying of cancer at home and was on hospice. The nurse warned us not to take him to the hospital if we wanted to be next to him when he died.