Publisher’s Note: We interrupt high summer in the 2nd Vermont Republic to bring you our Op/Ed on Vermont governor Phil Scott’s mandatory mask mandate. (We like your 2VR inspired mask, Governor, despite our different POV on this important public health question.) Vermonters have drafted and are circulating a “Masks By Choice” petition – sign it here and pass it on. See you Outside!

“If people let the government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as are the souls of those who live under tyranny.”

– Thomas Jefferson –

I write to all Vermont citizens in support of a COVID-19 “masks by choice” policy rather than a statewide “mandated masks” law such as the one mandated by Governor Phil Scott on July 24^th, 2020. 

To be clear, as a Vermont citizen of the town of Waitsfield, I fully support the right of any individual to wear a mask at any time, and I support the decision of any Vermont business to mandate mask wearing by customers in their privately-owned shop or store. 

I oppose, however, the passage of mandatory ordinance-driven mask wearing by both Vermont’s state government and democratically elected Vermont boards of civil authority, particularly given the tidal wave of media-induced misinformation, pharmaceutical industry fearmongering, and phobia-driven “group think” surrounding the current COVID-19 situation. 

Breaking news as of summer 2020. Re: COVID-19,  we now know that (click on links) 1) COVID probably arrived in the US many weeks earlier than originally reported; 2) the COVID infection rate may have proved 80 times higher and doubled nearly twice as fast as originally reported; 3) COVID “asymptomatic carriers” (healthy people) seem to rarely transmit the virus to others; and now 4) the US COVID mortality rate appears to be hovering at a very low 0.26 percent; with the 5) global COVID infection mortality rate for individuals under the age of 45 down near 0. Of all fifty states, Vermont has been least impacted by COVID-19, due to our rural demographic, our clean air and water, and our high level of collective social trust, as Vermont environmentalist Bill McKibben asserts in this July 2020 New Yorker article. 

Given all this good news, I find it odd that Vermont’s local and state lawmakers are mandating masks by law for all Vermont citizens. I respectfully urge all Vermonters in positions of legislative authority to 1) thoughtfully consider the latest public health data re: COVID-19 (see links above and articles below), and 2) professionally conduct an exhaustive review of the medical and policy literature on the public health, economic and political consequences of mandatory mask wearing. 

Otherwise, any vote to pass laws mandating mask wearing in any Vermont town and in the state of Vermont as a whole  will be, by necessity, based on fear rather than reason, politics rather than peer-reviewed science,  and “virtue signaling” rather than a well-researched respect for the health and wellness of our fellow Vermonters here in our Green Mountain communities.

Why would individual Vermonters make a choice to breathe freely by forgoing a mask? The answer seems obvious, but we live in strange and confusing times.  Having personally spoken to many Vermont friends and neighbors about this very question, I’ve learned that Vermonters who decide not to mask up are committed to a wide variety of scientific, medical, philosophical, health-related or spiritual points of view to justify their decision. And make no mistake. Mandatory mask wearing ordinances represents a form of “medical martial law,” particularly if violators – your Vermont friends and neighbors – choose not to wear a mask in the face of such a restrictive ordinance. 

Six questions:

1.SCIENCE: What specific scientific studies (peer reviewed, involving randomized control trials with measurable outcomes) conclusively indicate that mandated mask wearing will provide a solution to the COVID-19 situation? (Remembering that the WHO, the CDC, and most all the MSM news outlets are funded by the pharmaceuticals industry and powerful global organizations like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation who are NOT neutral objective actors in shaping and managing this “coronavirus pandemic” – witness the daily MSM “news” outlets shrieking about the “sudden spike” in “new cases” of COVID-19 all summer long, even as the COVID mortality rates across the country flatten towards zero – GREAT news, because this means that more humans are contracting the virus, we’re moving closer to natural herd immunity, and thus, the virus is much less deadly than we were told last winter and spring.)

2. ENFORCEMENT: How will mandatory mask wearing laws be enforced by local and state authorities here in Vermont?

3. PUNISHMENT: Will mandatory mask wearing laws subject our fellow Vermont citizens to civil, financial or even criminal penalties for refusing to comply to mandatory mask wearing laws?

4. DURATION: For how long will this Vermont mandatory mask wearing ordinance be enforced and under what public health policy reasoning? 

5. END DATE: How will we in Vermont collectively determine when we can remove our masks, by law?

6. LEGAL BLOWBACK: Will Vermont towns and the state of Vermont in toto be subject to legal action if someone wearing a mandated mask gets injured or injures others, and said mask is found to be involved?

Big picture. It should be noted that, until summer 2020, every major US health organization, as well as the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO), all definitively stated that wearing masks has no impact in altering potential viral transmission between humans, because aerosolized viral particles are  much too small (measured in microns) to be blocked by any sort of face covering – “like using a chain link fence to stop a mosquito,” in the words of Dr. Rashid Buttar. 

Even more troubling, the regular wearing of facemasks brings health harm to otherwise healthy humans. How so? Myriad ways. Breath by breath, masks can decrease our oxygen intake and recycle CO2 instead of expelling this waste gas away from our noses and mouths, thus increasing our cortisol levels (stress, anxiety and fear), and decreasing the effectiveness of our bodies’ immune systems, not to mention the psychological harm that accompanies not being able to see, read and experience our fellow humans face to face, even at a distance. In short, masks dramatically decrease our highly evolved ability to read each other’s facial, social and emotional cues at a time when we most need access to each other’s faces, arms, and hearts. We’ve all experienced these traumatizing physical, social and psychological effects. Just ask anyone in Vermont. Mandating mask wearing by law contributes to this traumatic situation.

Considering all these negative consequences, for Vermont’s local or state government officials to mandate mask wearing through town or state ordinance commits a double public disservice – compromising the health and wellness of otherwise healthy Vermont citizens, while offering false assurances premised on politicized science to our entire Vermont community under the guise of “caution.” 

I urge every elected Vermont official to take the time to thoughtfully research and carefully consider the consequences of a “masks by mandate” decision consider returning to “masks by choice” guidelines.

Respectfully,

Rob Williams, Ph.D.

PS: Here are several readable and informative summaries re: COVID, masks, health and beyond. 

A LIST of affordable proven COVID cures (beyond a daily health regimen of healthy food, regular exercise, nightly rest, daily meditation, and meaningful work / relationships with family and friends).

CLICK: http://orthomolecular.org/resources/omns/v16n37.shtml

Neurosurgeon Russell Blaylock, M.D.; “Face Masks Pose Serious Risks To The Healthy”

CLICK: https://www.technocracy.news/blaylock-face-masks-pose-serious-risks-to-the-healthy/?fbclid=IwAR1ukQjaRQ1kjKDMjvPFqo5UgtR9W650QUGvEmtpyJsBIRN4tyIFONDZlFk

Dr. Alan Palmer; “The Risks Vs. The Benefits Of Face Masks”

CLICK: https://childrenshealthdefense.org/news/the-risks-vs-benefits-of-face-masks-is-there-an-agenda/?utm_source=salsa&eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=94285a66-0edc-4ff8-8531-43b518228e92

Denis G. Rancourt, Ph.D.; Masks Don’t Work – A Review Of Science Relevant To COVID-19 Social Policy”

CLICK: https://www.rcreader.com/commentary/masks-dont-work-covid-a-review-of-science-relevant-to-covide-19-social-policy

John Hardie, BDS, MSc, PhD, FRCDC; “Why Face Masks Don’t Work: A Revealing Review”

CLICK: https://web.archive.org/web/20200509053953/https:/www.oralhealthgroup.com/features/face-masks-dont-work-revealing-review/         

Lisa M. Brousseau ScD and Margaret Sietsema, PhD; “Masks-For-All for COVID-19 Is Not Based On Sound Data”

Click: https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/04/commentary-masks-all-covid-19-not-based-sound-data

Colleen Huber, NM; “Masks Are Neither Effective Nor Safe – A Summary Of The Science” 

Click: https://www.primarydoctor.org/masks-not-effect

Ben Swann, “Why Face Masks Don’t Work, According to Science”

Click on Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8upEg-bEJ8

Click on Part 2: http://youtu.be/jy_7a8GNN4Q

Association of American Physicians and Surgeons on Ineffectiveness of Face Masks re: Viruses

Click: https://www.technocracy.news/association-of-american-physicians-and-surgeons-sounds-off-on-face-masks/

Allison R. Lucas, “What Happens When The CDC Uses Crude Science To Support Public Policy”

Click: https://jennifermargulis.net/cdc-mask-wearing-policy-not-supported-by-science/

Lisa M Brousseau, ScD and Margaret Sietsema, PhD, “Masks For All For COVID-19 Not Based On Sound Data”

Click: https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/04/commentary-masks-all-covid-19-not-based-sound-data

The Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, “Masking Lack Of Evidence With Politics”

Click: https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/masking-lack-of-evidence-with-politics/

Denis Rancourt, COVID 15 Minute “Deep Dive” (including science around masks and viruses)