Added 4 and 5 to make it easier to answer.
1. You should have added 'known' to have died. No one knows the real number, and to state on shows a lack of understanding of epidemiology. Leave it to the experts to judge, reading without peer assessment has no basis in academia.
Actually the numbers of deaths related to COVID are inflated. People have died of heart attack’s but tested positive for COVID- no specification on current or past infection-and had their death attributed to COVID. All to get more money from the Federal Government.
2. Again, who knows? There is no recording of numbers, there are vaccines that work for some and not for others, and there are many that are symptomless. This is not influenza, so cannot be judged like. Trust if you see people who get covid, it ain't pretty.
Cases of severe flu aren’t pretty either. Just like the flu there is a spectrum of human responses to the virus—some a symptomatic and others severe.
3. Most are afraid of death. Those deeply religious whilst wanting to go to a place like heaven, don't want to die to get there. The fear with Covid, is the extent of the illness is as random as winning the lottery.
So is all of life.
4. There are no studies on masks relevant to your claim. To clarify, you don't indicate a type of mask, and so therefore I have been broadly sweeping in my repost. There are certain masks that prevent certain sized pathogens. However, all face coverings have the ability to stop spray from one human to another, along with hand washing, and being aware of what you touch, is good strategy. Within healthcare, we know to do this for decades, you're learning for the first time. Trust us.
I have been a healthcare worker. This is not my first rodeo. Anything other than an N95 properly fitted won’t protect the person wearing the mask. Most studies which have been done and demonstrate it are out of Asia. The WHO referenced such a study in a footnote in its most recent statement on COVID.
Yes masks help prevent spray but once the mask is damp it is ineffective and actually transmits the virus faster to the wearer.
5. Masks are never sterile, to sterile paper or cotton, you either need to use a glutaraldehyde, Ethylene Oxide or steam sterilisation. A non 95 mask quickly soils after 3 mins, but that's not the point of the message being passed to you. The message is 'minimise your contact, inparticular handling, touching or being within someones cough range. Wearing a mask reduces the spray and therefore the distancing.
You may be bored, or fed up of Covid 19, but your life will not go back to the way it was, until we have minimised it's effect of the world's population. Be a good citizen not a Charlie Sheen.
You will never minimize its effect. It is a virus. It is in the wild now. It will never go away. If indeed immunity is difficult to measure or lasts only a short time then society has a choice to make—live and practice good hygiene like has always been recommended or live behind a mask and isolated.
