Biden’s medical advisor, Dr. Anthony Fauci, appeared on MSNBC with Andrea Mitchell on Tuesday and said there was “no doubt” kids as young as three years old should be wearing masks.
Mitchell, to her credit, noted that children do not generally get sick from COVID but asked Fauci what the spread of the Delta variant means for kids under 12 who aren’t eligible to get vaccinated.
“Unvaccinated children of a certain age greater than two years old should be wearing masks,” Fauci said. “No doubt about that.”
“That’s the way to protect them from getting infected, because if they do,” he continued, “they can then spread the infection to someone else.”
Fauci says 3-year-olds should be forced to wear masks: “No doubt about that” pic.twitter.com/rCWFCWPkjs
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) July 13, 2021
Worse yet, Fauci was being asked specifically about the Delta variant, which, as has been previously established, is far less deadly than the original strain. The Delta variant is more contagious, but, as has been previously established as well, children are not superspreaders of COVID-19.
According to CDC data, out of the 600,000+ total deaths from COVID since the start of the pandemic, only 331 were under 17.
Unfortunately, this only makes me more concerned that the Biden administration will use the Delta variant as a pretext for restoring COVID restrictions, like mask mandates and lockdowns. Fauci wrote in an email on February 5, 2020, that “Masks are really for infected people to protect them from spreading infection to people who are not infected rather than protecting uninfected people from acquiring infection.” He added, “The typical mask you buy in the drug store is not really effective in keeping out virus, which is small enough to pass through the material.” He’s since walked back that advice.
Yet now he says little kids should be wearing masks, even though a recent lab test showed that even freshly-laundered masks that “had been worn for 5 to 8 hours, most during in-person schooling by children aged 6 through 11” contained eleven dangerous pathogens.
Last month, Fauci called the Delta variant the “greatest threat” to the nation’s efforts to eliminate COVID. There was absolutely no justification for using such loaded language. Just as unnecessary is his call for kids aged 3-12 to continue wearing masks. Unfortunately, despite the data showing that children could return to school safely and mask-free, the CDC still recommends that “masks should be worn indoors by all individuals (age 2 and older) who are not fully vaccinated.”
Sorry, but I’m not buying it. Kids are not at significant risk and aren’t super spreaders. Let them be mask-free!
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