This Reader Supports Face Mask Wearing. What Do You Think?
In response to a piece of writing entitled “Surgical Face Masks Were Made For Surgery And Might Not Even Work For That,” a reader has written to share a reason that face masks are good to wear. A reader writes:
====
Dear Allan,
I think surgical face mask are at least an important reminder to practice sterile technique, when you have to cut away so many of the natural layers of protection against infection to operate on a patient. There is a certain common sense aspect to it. As to how effective the surgical face mask is, I suspect, but only suspect, it provides limited protection for at least something. Dr. Semmelweis demonstrated the importance of sterile technique rather conclusively. Maternity wards in America today, alas, have a significantly higher rate of infection and complications than his.
Regards,
-A Reader
====
Ignaz Semmelweis
Thank you, dear reader, for your note. Ignaz Semmelweis is a hero of mine. My years spent in Central Europe after college have served to further grow my appreciation for him, as I so intimately understand the stultified social environment in which he operates.
Semmelweis believed something bad was on the hands of doctors who walked all day long between the birthing suite and the dissection laboratory, something that was making women of that era sick after childbirth. He suggested hand washing, and proved its effectiveness in that particular situation.
The man sounded crazy to the men of his era who reasoned that the hands of gentlemen doctors could not possibly be dirty, by virtue of the hands being the hands of gentlemen. You could call it the social station theory of disease that they practiced. If you exist in a certain social station you cannot possibly transmit disease.
Semmelweis pointed out that there was a problem with taking your hands out of a cadaver one minute and rushing to the maternity ward the next minute to deliver a baby, with the filthy smell of rotting putrescence still on your hands. Many women were becoming sick in that environment and even dying. Had they simply opted for the standard home-birth with the midwife, they could rest assured that no one would smear cadaver goop either on their baby or on their private parts. But those who wanted to let the learned men of the era deliver their baby received exactly that treatment.
Semmelweis Did Not Prove “Sterile Technique”
To be clear, Semmelweis did not demonstrate that a face mask needed wearing. Also, Semmelweis did not demonstrate the effectiveness of all techniques that contemporary establishment scientists and medical professionals call “sterile technique.” Semmelweis demonstrated that a doctor should wash his hands when moving between cadaver and birthing mother in order to protect the mother from illness. Dear reader, you have taken the concept of sterile technique and used it to fit face masks. Sterile technique has grown into a beast all its own, and the various parts of t
Article from LewRockwell
LewRockwell.com is a libertarian website that publishes articles, essays, and blog posts advocating for minimal government, free markets, and individual liberty. The site was founded by Lew Rockwell, an American libertarian political commentator, activist, and former congressional staffer. The website often features content that is critical of mainstream politics, state intervention, and foreign policy, among other topics. It is a platform frequently used to disseminate Austrian economics, a school of economic thought that is popular among some libertarians.
