Originally posted on brownstone.org by Dr. Vinay Prasad,MD MPH, April 8, 2022

On the one hand, there are many biomedical faculty who are passionately arguing why 2-4 year olds should be forced to wear cloth masks. (NY City is fighting this in the courts). Even though there is no randomized data, even though cloth masks failed in adults (let alone toddlers), even though it contradicts the WHO, even though it fails common sense, we must keep doing this!

On the other hand, doctors post pictures of them attending industry sponsored academic conferences. Getting drinks and partying. Packed in tight rooms. No masks. Praising each other for their work. Drenched in financial conflict of interest and pro-new and pro-costly bias.

How can both these things be true?

We are facing such a health emergency that we have to mask toddlers by force of law AND we can continue to enjoy entirely superfluous medical gatherings that risk viral spread.

Don’t say it’s vaccines.

Because the vaccinated, boosted 50 year old, elevated BMI doc with comorbidities has far higher risk than the healthy, unvax’d 4 year old.

Don’t say it’s about spreading the virus.

Both can spread the virus to others.

Don’t say it’s about the activities importance.

The adult’s entirely excessive medical conference is less important than the child’s early education.

COVID-19 policy reveals the selfishness of adults, the indifference to kids, and the hypocrisy of medicine. It’s disgusting to witness and history will judge it poorly.