WORSE than seeing infants walking to school wearing face masks, one of the most upsetting things I saw during the time of mask mandates was parents forcing babies, who were clearly distressed, to wear face masks and struggling with them to keep the mask in place. Now we know that this could have proved fatal.
Thankfully, with the occasional exception, we have seen the light in the United Kingdom over face masks. But I visit the Far East regularly and, while masks have always been a common sight there, on a recent visit to Hong Kong I saw many schoolchildren continued to wear masks and very young children and babies were made to wear masks by their parents on public transport.
It is hardly surprising but no less distressing to read the news from Taiwan where, like other parts of the Far East they took to masks mandates with enthusiasm, that an 11-month old boy has died after being forced to wear a face mask at nursery. The incident took place on January 24, despite the fact that mask mandates related to childcare in Taiwan were lifted over a year ago.
The details are harrowing but nevertheless instructive, showing just how effective brainwashing regarding face masks has been:
‘According to surveillance video footage viewed by the parents, the incident happened when the boy became irritated and took off his mask, after which the teacher put it back on for him. At that point, the child burst out crying, which possibly saturated the mask with tears and mucus, causing it to stick to his nose and mouth and suffocate him. In the video footage, the child was then seen “struggling” and “falling over”. The teacher, however, apparently assumed he had become exhausted and fallen asleep, and only discovered that he was unresponsive 20 minutes later, when it was time to move the children to another room.’
It has since been confirmed that the child did not have any cardiac defects which could have exacerbated his condition. He died as a direct result of having been forced to wear a face mask. Any child’s death under these circumstances would be heartbreaking but, in addition to this almost unimaginable incident, there is the back story of the parents’ struggle for many years to have a baby.
In addition to the tragedy, two things are striking from this story: the absence of any mention of the death in the international legacy media (I could find no reference to it other than in Taiwanese newspapers); and the outrage which seems to be aimed only at the fact that this incident exceeded the expired mask mandate.
The veil of silence by the press outside Taiwan is hardly surprising given the role that they played in promoting the wearing of face masks. In the United Kingdom the Guardian said that the government should promote the wearing of face masks ‘more forcefully’. The New York Times recently tried to discredit Jefferson and colleagues’ Cochrane review showing no evidence for the effectiveness of face masks claiming, ‘Why the Science Is Clear That Masks Work’.
There is a story here: face masks have never been recommended in the United States for children under two. Moreover, according to NPR which is a very pro-mask publication, ‘The World Health Organization does not recommend masks for children under age five, while the European equivalent of the CDC doesn’t recommend them for children under age 12.’
However, the mask maniacs in the newspapers of record probably consider that no bad news about face masks is permitted, even if the masks were being used inappropriately. After all, like the Covid-19 vaccines, the use of face masks was declared safe, even in ‘intense exercise’, according to the Guardian.
Face masks are far from safe. We know they are harmful: they excoriate the skin of users and increase carbon dioxide levels in the blood of wearers. Socially, they impair communication in children and there are strong suspicions that they may hinder brain development. Most publications mitigate their reports with comments about the harms being outweighed by the risks. But face masks have always been a con and the cost in the United Kingdom alone during the covid years was £252million. Many of them were considered faulty and remain unused.
It is hard to fathom the enthusiasm with which people in the Far East took to mask mandates and continue to wear them voluntarily. Both Hong Kong and Taiwan were draconian in this respect and insisted on face masks being worn outside, as well as in public spaces. Hong Kong lifted its mask mandate only in February 2023 and Taiwan in April 2023. In Hong Kong masks were available for babies and Taiwan clearly had a face mask policy in place in infant care centres such as the one where the tragedy reported above occurred.
The evidence of the dangers in wearing face masks and the abject stupidity of policymakers who would insist, at any time, in inflicting them on children is clear. In relation to the death of the baby in Taiwan, an expert on the subject, Dr Peter Gøtzsche, said:
‘Forcing people to wear masks has been a failure of public health’ and ‘the reason we are still having the mask debate is because authorities relied on trash studies to justify their use, and wanted to appear as if they were doing something. In a crisis, it is always more difficult to do nothing.’