The Mask Returns to Philadelphia Schools
On Wednesday, January 4th, nearly 200,000 public and charter school students will return to school in Philadelphia. They will all be met by a security official reminding them to put a mask over their faces.
Due to a policy set out at the start of this school year in August, anytime classes resume after an extended holiday break, masks will be required for two weeks that follow. There’s never been any reason cited other than people gather with their extended families at these times, and that’s an incubator of disease.
Unnecessary masking has also been adopted as policy for jurors in the city’s courts and attendees at City Council meetings. The City’s Health Department seems to be in the thrall of CDC fear-mongering and unable to perform rudimentary cost/benefit analysis. Masking seems to be about deference and obedience, not public health, as when citizens in court proceedings and City Council hearings must speak through masks when addressing unmasked public officials.
Despite the fact that students have no statistical risk from COVID-19, there has been no organized opposition to these autocratic policies in Philadelphia, though communities outside the City are protesting. The danger of this type compliance training must be recognized for what it is, a calculated behavioral conditioning of children to obey authority regardless of the legitimate nature of the orders. We’ve all been victims of this for years by the use of TSA’s meaningless orders such as water bottle bans and shoe removal.
If you are a parent or guardian of a child who is still being bullied into wearing a mask, please consider filing an application for a mask exemption for your child. The Philly School District’s exemption form is linked here. Make sure to send one to your school nurse and also have the child carry one to show if questioned.
For pre-existing medical conditions, the form “requires” a doctor’s signature. This is backwards. Healthy children should not need a mask, and only those who have special vulnerabilities might benefit from protection which would need to be a respirator. PA-CHD recommends filling this out with NOT APPLICABLE to my child, as a rational protest.
If challenged by school authorities, please consider drafting a letter to support your valid claims. You might consider using the provided language to start. A Word Doc version is available here with all footnotes and links. Defending Your Mask Exemption draft letter.
Dear School District Official,
My child has a medical exemption for mask wearing in school to prevent the spread of illness identified as Covid-19. We have determined, through careful consideration of the medical research on the Covid-19 illness, respiratory viral infection in general and mask wearing, that our child’s risks from wearing a mask for extended periods far exceed any risk posed by Covid-19.
A doctor’s signature, as requested in the District’s Accommodation Request, cannot be provided as my child is currently healthy. [He/She] does not fit any criterion that a doctor may evaluate as listed on the form. A doctor would be understandably hesitant to sign such a document for a healthy child to exempt them from an unnecessary medical intervention. In other locals, doctors have been threatened with censure, or even lost their licenses for signing too many exemption forms.
The accepted statistic for the risk of death for a child between the ages of 0 and 19 years from Covid-19 is 0.0003%. This is in the same range as the risk of being struck by lightning. The risk for a child to die of seasonal flu is far higher. Oxford University maintains a Covid-19 risk assessment calculator which aligns with this scientific record. Since there is statistically no risk of death from Covid-19 for children the calculator tool only assess ages above 18 years.
My child has no pre-existing morbidities and has no reason to be anxious about contracting a flu or corona virus. He is not at risk from catching or spreading Sars-CoV-2 virus. The cumulative weight of science suggests, and the CDC has confirmed, his chance of already having developed antibodies to this novel virus is over 80%. CDC’s graph below was published early last year. The CDC, in the study cited, expects a 0.9-1.9% increase in these statistics each month. Thus, it is expected that the vast majority of students in this school district have already been exposed and have developed levels of resistance.
If the School District finds that this parent’s concerns about the lack of risk of contracting a clinical case of Covid-19 is unfounded, due to research the District and it’s Chief Medical Officer have collected or conducted, then the School District must affirm that the requirement of the medical intervention of masking not contribute to an elevated risk of the following conditions that are known to be enhanced by wearing of a mask. This kind of risk benefit calculation is essential to the mandating of any medical intervention.
Affirm masking will not contribute to an elevated risk of the following conditions:
- Immune suppression and other physiological effects caused by hypoxia and hypercapnia, a universal condition produced by all types of masks.
- Oral thrush, oral candidiasis
- RSV, Respiratory syncytial virus
- Bacterial pneumonia
- Bacterial meningitis
- Dental complications (increased incidences of tooth decay and gum disease)
- Increased severity of Sars-CoV-2 infection and possible brain infection via olfactory nerves
- Increased incidents and severity of acne, acne vulgaris.
Additionally, the School District must be sensitive to the disruption in the development, exercise and mastery of communications skills that the imposition of mask wearing creates in a learning environment. Test scores for elementary students in Philadelphia as elsewhere have slipped by a full grade since COVID disruptions began.
Because statistically significance evidence of the use of masks for the protection against respiratory viral infection has never been established a requirement to wear such an intervention must be voluntary.
There are simple and inexpensive respirators that do statistically prevent infection from respiratory virus. The 3M P100 is just such a “mask” although technically a respirator. These like all occupational masks must be fitted by an OSHA trained specialist to be considered functional. No regulatory agency recommends anyone where a mask or respirator for more than two hours because of clearly established risks to health, some of which are outlined in the footnotes provided.
It is imperative that this school district amend its policy to reflect the facts understood about masks and viral infection established over decades of testing and confirmed through contemporary research. A medical intervention that cannot demonstrate a benefit commensurate with its risks cannot be ethically or legally mandated.