Fox News host Tucker Carlson reversed course Tuesday and suggested face masks are ineffective against slowing the spread of COVID-19, the disease the coronavirus causes.
Mr. Carlson, who earlier this year on his program said that “of course” masks work at combating the contagious respiratory disease, criticized schools planning to make them mandatory when classes resume.
“Many schools that do plan to reopen will do so under a series of restrictions that have no basis of any kind in science. It’s kind of a bizarre health theater. Students will be kept six feet apart, everyone will have to wear a mask, class sizes will be limited, in some schools there will be scheduled bathroom breaks, et cetera, et cetera,” Mr. Carlson said during his show’s latest episode.
Mr. Carlson voiced a vastly different opinion about wearing masks in late March, however.
“Of course masks work. Everyone knows that. Dozens of research papers have proved it. In South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, the rest of Asia — where coronavirus has been kept under control — masks were key,” Mr. Carlson said March 30.
Indeed, public health experts have repeatedly stressed that face coverings are effective at slowing the spread of COVID-19 since the contagious disease is mainly transmitted from person-to-person, and often in droplets expelled when an infected person speaks, coughs or sneezes. It can also be transmitted asymptomatically, meaning a carrier may potentially spread the disease without ever realizing they were infected in the first place.
Most recently, the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington projected Tuesday that more than 40,000 deaths in the U.S. can be prevented in the coming months if at least 95% of people in the country wear masks when in public.
“We can now see the projected trajectory of the epidemic into the fall, and many states are expected to experience significant increases in cases and deaths in September and October,” IHME Director Dr. Christopher Murray said in a statement. “However, as we all have come to recognize, wearing masks can substantially reduce transmission of the virus. Mask mandates delay the need for re-imposing closures of businesses and have huge economic benefits. Moreover, those who refuse masks are putting their lives, their families, their friends and their communities at risk.”
Mr. Carlson’s false claims that wearing masks and practicing social distancing are ineffective ways to mitigate the coronavirus pandemic was widely panned afterward, including by fellow conservative commentator Jennifer Rubin, among others.
“Fox News puts this on the air. People listen and die,” Ms. Rubin reacted on Twitter. “If you have a conscience you have no business working there; if you are an advertiser who are facilitating deaths.”
Jay Rosen, a journalism professor at New York University, said Mr. Carlson “goes beyond giving bad information,” meanwhile, tweeting: “It’s entering on [death] cult territory.”
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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