My Letter to my Head of School

Concerning the mask mandate and "immunity rates"

Throughout this school year, I have continuously attempted to restore some semblance of normalcy to the lives of my students. I fought against the outdoor lunch policy, which had children at my school eating in frigid temperatures and off of the cold, hard concrete. I garnered some parental support in my battle against this barbarity, and because of that fact, the students have mostly eaten indoors during these winter months. However, the mask mandate at my school still stands, and nearly all teachers strictly enforce it.

I, however, have consistently told my students that masks cannot not stop spread of an aerosolized respiratory pathogen. They know I’m against the mask mandate, because I told them that I am, so some of my student’s let their masks fall below their noses in my class, and I ignore it. Furthermore, because I consider lying to children immoral, whenever they ask about masks, I tell them the truth: masks have not provided any distinguishable benefit in preventing Covid-19 infections anywhere in the world. They simply do not work.

I have voiced my concerns about the mandatory masking of students and teachers in private meetings on two occasions with my principal and vice principal. Most recently, I challenged the mask mandate during a school-wide meeting in front of my entire faculty and staff. I am the only teacher at my school to publicly oppose the mask mandate; no other teacher has said a word against masks in any of our school’s bi-weekly meetings where administrators update the health and safety guidelines. But I haven’t taken my grievances to the Head of School, until now.

The Head of School functions as the spokesperson for the school while managing the school’s affairs, including the Covid-19 protocols. He rarely ever sets foot on my school’s campus, preferring to impose the unscientific dictates of the Health and Safety Committee, which he leads, from a distance. Prior to my direct communication with the Head of School, my principal informed me that he relayed my concerns to the Health and Safety Committee. Having my principal function as an intermediary, though, hasn’t done much, because everyone is still required to wear a mask inside the building.

After the faculty and staff received an Orwellian email from my Head of School concerning the school’s “immunity rate” and the Covid vaccines, and how they impact our containment measures, I reached out directly with some pertinent questions, and, finally, a request to lift the mask mandate.

Additionally, I provided my Head of School with numerous citations to support the points I made within my email, all of which you can read below, and use for yourself, if you’re also fighting an inhumane, unscientific school mask mandate.

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Dear [Head of School], 

I am emailing you with concerns over the continuation of mandatory masking at [our school], as well as the logic behind when the school will lift its Covid-19 containment measures. 

Firstly, evidence suggests that facemasks have failed miserably in preventing the spread of Covid-19. Nowhere in the world have they helped reduce transmission rates. Innumerable studies throughout several decades have expounded upon the inability of facemasks to prevent infection and transmission of respiratory pathogens. Indeed, up until 2020, the scientific literature did not support the use of facemasks in the community setting as a useful measure for halting the spread of viruses. And since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, not a single study has properly demonstrated that masks actually work. Many studies detail the harmful effects of wearing a facemask.

My questions to you, the Health and Safety Committee, and [our partners in the local university health network]:  

• Where is the evidence that wearing a mask at school helps prevent the spread of Covid-19? 

• Has the Health and Safety Committee reviewed the scientific literature on potential mask harms?

• Has the Health and Safety Committee conducted a risk-benefit analysis of masking children and teachers during school? If so, for the sake of transparency, may I please see the analysis? If the Committee did not conduct an analysis, why not? 

My other concern has to do with the criteria [our school] is using to lift its containment measures. In a recent email, you wrote that once “immunity rates” reach a certain level, some of our school’s protocols would change. You referred to “immunity rates” as the “the number of individuals who are vaccinated or who have had the natural disease.” 

Again, my question to you, the Health and Safety Committee, and [our partners in the local university health network]: 

• How can “immunity rates” include the three Covid-19 vaccines when these vaccines do not confer immunity? A leaky (non-sterilizing) vaccine cannot contribute to herd immunity. Linking “immunity rates” to a vaccine that does not confer immunity is pure Orwellian doublespeak. In fact, the most vaccinated countries in the world, Israel, Denmark, etc. now have their highest Covid-19 cases to date. On a micro level, many of my vaccinated colleagues and students have missed school because of a Covid infection. Looking at the data, one can now conclude that the vaccines have an overall negative efficacy, i.e. they make you more susceptible to infection. It makes zero epidemiological sense to base “immunity rates'' on these products. Why don’t your experts acknowledge this reality?

I would like to express my personal sentiments about wearing a mask in school. Without question, teaching while wearing a mask negatively impacts the teacher-student relationship, since effective communication depends on one’s ability to fully interpret facial expressions. Additionally, considering the fact that many students and teachers now engage in daily activities without burdensome Covid restrictions, like masking and distancing, life at our school feels uniquely punitive. Because of ongoing mask mandates, students now have the false impression that schools are the primary place where diseases spread. Mandatory masking also teaches students to consider themselves, their peers, and their teachers as vectors of disease. I find this deeply disturbing. 

Finally, schools all throughout The United States no longer have any restrictions and teachers and students get to experience pre-pandemic normality. They can smile at one another, speak without muffled voices, and take unrestricted breaths. There’s no reason why this cannot be the case at [our school]. Now, with the clinical symptoms of Omicron resembling a common cold, the virus entering endemic status, and no statewide mask mandate, I ask the Health and Safety Committee to lift the mandatory mask requirement and transition to a mask optional policy. 

Thank you,

[All-American Warrior Monk]

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Masks do not work: Sources

https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/5/4/e006577

“Moisture retention, reuse of cloth masks and poor filtration may result in increased risk of infection.”

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/5/19-0994_article

“In our systematic review, we identified 10 RCTs [randomized controlled trials] that reported estimates of the effectiveness of face masks in reducing laboratory-confirmed influenza virus infections in the community from literature published during 1946–July 27, 2018. In pooled analysis, we found no significant reduction in influenza transmission with the use of face masks...” 

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2749214

“Among outpatient health care personnel, N95 respirators vs medical masks as worn by participants in this trial resulted in no significant difference in the incidence of laboratory-confirmed influenza.”

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmp2006372

“We know that wearing a mask outside health care facilities offers little, if any, protection from infection...In many cases, the desire for widespread masking is a reflexive reaction to anxiety over the pandemic.”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC7357397/

“The wide variation in penetration levels for room air particles, which included particles in the same size range of viruses, confirms that surgical masks should not be used for respiratory protection.”

https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-6817

“…the recommendation to wear surgical masks to supplement other public health measures did not reduce the SARS-CoV-2 infection rate among wearers by more than 50% in a community with modest infection rates, some degree of social distancing, and uncommon general mask use.”

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2029717

“Our study showed that in a group of predominantly young male military recruits, approximately 2% became positive for SARS-CoV-2, as determined by qPCR assay, during a 2-week, strictly enforced quarantine. Multiple, independent virus strain transmission clusters were identified…all recruits wore double-layered cloth masks at all times indoors and outdoors.”

https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD006207.pub5/full

“There is low certainty evidence from nine trials (3507 participants) that wearing a mask may make little or no difference to the outcome of influenza‐like illness (ILI) compared to not wearing a mask (risk ratio (RR) 0.99, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.82 to 1.18. There is moderate certainty evidence that wearing a mask probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of laboratory‐confirmed influenza compared to not wearing a mask (RR 0.91, 95% CI 0.66 to 1.26; 6 trials; 3005 participants)…the pooled results of randomised trials did not show a clear reduction in respiratory viral infection with the use of medical/surgical masks during seasonal influenza.”

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32675098/#affiliation-1

“This systematic review found limited evidence that the use of masks might reduce the risk of viral respiratory infections.”

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1680906/

“Following the commissioning of a new suite of operating rooms air movement studies showed a flow of air away from the operating table towards the periphery of the room. Oral microbial flora dispersed by unmasked male and female volunteers standing one metre from the table failed to contaminate exposed settle plates placed on the table. The wearing of face masks by non-scrubbed staff working in an operating room with forced ventilation seems to be unnecessary.”

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8239046/

“We conclude that the protection provided by surgical masks may be insufficient in environments containing potentially hazardous sub-micrometer-sized aerosols.”

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27115326/

“We included three trials, involving a total of 2106 participants. There was no statistically significant difference in infection rates between the masked and unmasked group in any of the trials…from the limited results it is unclear whether the wearing of surgical face masks by members of the surgical team has any impact on surgical wound infection rates for patients undergoing clean surgery.”

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19216002/

“Face mask use in health care workers has not been demonstrated to provide benefit in terms of cold symptoms or getting colds.”

Mask harms: Sources

https://rationalground.com/dangerous-pathogens-found-on-childrens-face-masks/

“Half of the masks were contaminated with one or more strains of pneumonia-causing bacteria. One-third were contaminated with one or more strains of meningitis-causing bacteria. One-third were contaminated with dangerous, antibiotic-resistant bacterial pathogens. In addition, less dangerous pathogens were identified, including pathogens that can cause fever, ulcers, acne, yeast infections, strep throat, periodontal disease, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, and more.”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC8072811/

“The described mask-related changes in respiratory physiology can have an adverse effect on the wearer’s blood gases sub-clinically and in some cases also clinically manifest and, therefore, have a negative effect on the basis of all aerobic life, external and internal respiration, with an influence on a wide variety of organ systems and metabolic processes with physical, psychological and social consequences for the individual human being.”

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12070-020-02124-0

“This study suggests that prolonged use of facemasks induces difficulty in breathing on exertion and excessive sweating around the mouth to the healthcare workers which results in poorer adherence and increased risk of susceptibility to infection.”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC7087880/

“Therefore, it can be concluded that N95 and surgical facemasks can induce significantly different temperatures and humidity in the microclimates of facemasks, which have profound influences on heart rate and thermal stress and subjective perception of discomfort.”

Vaccine failure: Sources

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanepe/article/PIIS2666-7762(21)00258-1/fulltext

“In Israel a nosocomial outbreak was reported involving 16 healthcare workers, 23 exposed patients and two family members. The source was a fully vaccinated COVID-19 patient. The vaccination rate was 96.2% among all exposed individuals (151 healthcare workers and 97 patients). Fourteen fully vaccinated patients became severely ill or died, the two unvaccinated patients developed mild disease [[4]]. The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) identifies four of the top five counties with the highest percentage of fully vaccinated population (99.9–84.3%) as “high” transmission counties [[5]].”

https://vector-news.github.io/editorials/CausalAnalysisReport_html.html

“The results of this study taken together demonstrate a product that directly causes more COVID-19 associated cases and deaths than otherwise would have existed with zero vaccines….”

https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/vaccine-failure-in-two-charts-and/comments

“Scotland, Britain, Israel, and Denmark are four of the world’s most highly vaccinated countries. They all have 90 percent adult Covid vaccination rates and 60 percent adult boosters. Yet the vast majority of deaths are occurring in vaccinated people; serious cases are soaring; and infections are almost literally off the charts.”

There is no epidemiologically relevant asymptomatic transmission: Sources

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2774102

“Household secondary attack rates were increased from symptomatic index cases (18.0%; 95% CI, 14.2%-22.1%) than from asymptomatic index cases (0.7%; 95% CI, 0%-4.9%), to adult contacts…”

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w

“Here, we describe a city-wide SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid screening programme between May 14 and June 1, 2020 in Wuhan. All city residents aged six years or older were eligible and 9,899,828 (92.9%) participated. No new symptomatic cases and 300 asymptomatic cases (detection rate 0.303/10,000, 95% CI 0.270–0.339/10,000) were identified. There were no positive tests amongst 1,174 close contacts of asymptomatic cases.”

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32513410/

“In summary, all the 455 contacts were excluded from SARS-CoV-2 infection and we conclude that the infectivity of some asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 carriers might be weak.”