Tear Down These Masks The bitter-enders in public education won’t allow kids to see each other smile. James Freeman
https://www.wsj.com/articles/tear-down-these-masks-11644019001?mod=opinion_lead_pos11
The adults who run a number of Virginia school boards have decided to wage legal warfare to maintain their ability to force children to cover their faces. The Washington Post’s Hannah Natanson and Rachel Weiner report:
An Arlington judge has issued a temporary restraining order barring enforcement of Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s mask-optional order for schools—a major victory for the seven school boards that sued to stop the order, and a sharp rebuke for the new governor.
The Post reporters outline the legal case made by the school boards:
The first part of the argument hinges on the fact that Virginia’s constitution specifies that school boards have the power to oversee the school systems in their localities. By declaring masks optional in school districts statewide, Youngkin is intruding on school boards’ constitutionally granted authority, the plaintiffs in both suits argue.
The second part centers on a piece of legislation passed last year that requires all school districts in Virginia to comply with federal health guidance to the “maximum extent practicable.” The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends masking inside schools for all individuals over the age of 2, regardless of vaccination status. Because of those CDC guidelines, the plaintiffs argue, Youngkin’s order making masks optional is forcing school districts to break the law.
At a hearing in early February, Arlington District Court Judge Louise DiMatteo seemed unswayed by this argument, noting that no district complies with all of the CDC’s recommendations.
This column is also skeptical of the school boards’ argument, and is certain that their underlying policies are unsupported by the facts. There is no need for the school boards to agree with the governor on the questions of state law to recognize that they cannot prove clear public health benefits justifying the indefinite masking of children and the developmental harms that result.
No one can accuse the editors of the Atlantic magazine of being insufficiently hysterical about the risks of Covid during this pandemic. And even they had the good sense recently to publish medical scientists Margery Smelkinson, Leslie Bienen, and Jeanne Noble noting:
We reviewed a variety of studies—some conducted by the CDC itself, some cited by the CDC as evidence of masking effectiveness in a school setting, and others touted by media to the same end—to try to find evidence that would justify the CDC’s no-end-in-sight mask guidance for the very-low-risk pediatric population, particularly post-vaccination. We came up empty-handed.
Even without vaccination, the value of natural immunity is finally being recognized. Research published this week by the Journal of the American Medical Association is the latest to suggest that protection after infection is long-lasting and powerful.
Now Dr. Noble joins more than a dozen other doctors in making the case against school mask mandates in an op-ed in USA Today:
As scientists and physicians, we are concerned that COVID-19 mitigation measures for children are doing more harm than good. Too many policymakers have viewed health as the mere absence of COVID-19, putting children into a loop of mitigation measures that are uncoupled from actual risk.
After two years of living with one disruption after another, the evidence is clear: The pandemic and the loss of normalcy are taking a tremendous toll on students, with the data on mental health being particularly alarming.
The American Academy of Pediatrics has declared a mental health emergency in children. As the surgeon general recently highlighted, combined analyses of 80,000 children found that symptoms of depression and anxiety have doubled among young people during the pandemic, with 1 in 4 showing depressive symptoms and 1 in 5 showing anxiety . . .
It’s time to shift our focus away from masks and onto the faces behind them. Mandatory masking policies are the most visible COVID mitigation interventions in schools. We have reviewed the data on school masking and find that well-controlled real-world studies consistently fail to find a convincing benefit, while studies cited to support masking have serious flaws. When an intervention’s possible benefits are too small to measure and the harms are increasingly evident, it is appropriate to end its mandatory use.
Above all, we entreat policymakers to fully restore normal life and school for all children at the first opportunity. The school years are critical for cognitive, emotional and social development. It is time to recognize the myriad threats to children’s safety—beyond that of a single virus—and to appropriately balance these risks.
The scientific case for masking children has collapsed. It’s time for the people entrusted with their education to put down the legal weapons and allow what’s left of a normal childhood to resume.
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