During the 2019 flu season in Canada, 46k people were diagnosed with influenza. That's not people who "felt sick", that's people who went to their doctor or emergency, had a test done, and were told "yup, that's the flu".

Of those 46k, 2000 had symptoms severe enough to be hospitalized so they could be monitored.

Of those 2000, 600 ended up in ICU, connected to machines to breath for them.

Of those 600, 200 died.

2019 had a fairly average flu season.

During the 2020 flu season, that was 69. Total. Zero hospitalization. Zero ICU. Zero deaths.

The 2021 flu season is almost over and since people were "more comfortable" this year not wearing masks where they should have been the numbers are higher, but still only in the hundreds of cases, with zero deaths to date.

If anyone tries to tell you masks don't work, there are statistically at least 400 people who did not die of the flu who prove otherwise.

WE PROBABLY ELIMINATED TWO STRAINS OF INFLUENZA IN HUMANS. WE CUT TRANSMISSION SO MUCH THE STRAIN DIED OUT BECAUSE IT COULDN’T SPREAD TO PEOPLE.

WEAR THE GOD DAMNED MASKS. 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/03/02/children-flu-deaths/

https://www.livescience.com/flu-virus-types-extinct-covid-19.html

[tweet by Alyssa Long] 

I will forever be salty that masking dramatically reduced flu season for two years running and the message is still somehow that saving people from deadly/disabling disease just isn’t worth not seeing peoples’ mouths. 

[/end tweet]

[Large red, white, and blue sign in a place of business. The sign is horizontally striped, with white text on red and blue stripes (except for one line of light blue text on a dark blue stripe) and red and blue text on the white stripes. There are stars in these three colours scattered over the poster, and a large white illustration of a facemask on the centre right. The text is in all capitals with no punctuation except for apostrophes.] 

As an American, you have a right to not wear a mask. 

As an American business, we have a right to refuse to serve those not wearing a mask. 

You can’t have it both ways. You are free to make a choice, but that means accepting the consequences of your actions. 

Screaming at employees and for businesses for protecting their workers and customers does not make you a patriot. It just makes you disrespectful. 

Don’t mistake inconvenience for oppression. 

[/end text]

Keep on trolling in the free world

[image of a black facemask, with another soft-focus facemask in the background, captioned] 

Keep wearing a mask 

just for fun ... use these lines when asked “why are you wearing that?” 

[dark red scribbly block text] now it’s our turn 

[/end image]

😑

@samthefrank

Video caption: Someday in 2026 

[A man puts on a jacket. In the pocket he finds a disposable medical face mask.] 

Video caption: When my old jacket brings up an emotional memories ... 

[He holds the mask to his face as though about to put it on, then lowers it, smiles, and shakes his head. He puts the facemask down. 

From off-camera, he retrieves a large and heavy-duty respirator mask and puts that over his face instead.]

Me: “Welcome! May I offer you a free mask?”

Visitor: [looks around incredulously] “But why? There’s no one else here.”

Me: “...well...there’s me?”

Visitor: [laughs] “You don’t have anything to worry about.”

Every day I’ll hear large groups pause outside the door, read the “masks recommended” sign, debate whether or not to put them on, and then say, “Oh, well, there’s no one here, just an employee. We don’t need them.”

Cool! Come inside and find out how good I am at spin kicks!

reblog to give retail and restaurant workers the right to spin kick unmasked entitled shitheads

Spinning back fist is also acceptable for those who can't high kick.

I’m the polar opposite of anti-maskers, in that no matter how low the risk of transmitting a disease in the future, I will be wearing a mask. It’s just a part of my going out clothes now.

Am I sick? Am I dysphoric? Am I trying to avoid the facial recognition technology of the dystopic modern age? None of your business, keep your distance.

Also i dont know if you guys have ever seen medieval beekeeper garb, but:

Its the best!!!

Nope!

Woodcut from 1545! 😊 respect our basket faced cousins 😡

The Beekeepers, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 1568

Now that plague doctors are cultural icons I want these to be next and I hope we arbitrarily decide that the two are somehow rivals.

why would they be rivals, they're dating and bop their masks together to kiss

The birds and the bees

!!!

They’re dating  ❤️

This is an actual product

Thats great! And when they release the multi million high tech oxygen bodysuit that goes with it, ill finally be sure we live in a sci-fi dystopian universe 🥰

False advertising! This is NOT a full-face covering, you can totally see the models’ foreheads.

1930s bat face mask

well well well

[tweet attributed to paige dzenis] The most deranged yet delightful thing I read today is that some anti-maskers/vaxxers are now wearing masks out of fear that a vaccinated person will “shed” vaccine side effects onto them [end tweet]

[screenshot of typed sentence] The circle of stupidity is complete. [end screenshot]

1700's medical illustrators be like "hey boss can I put a rhinoceros behind this anotomically correct sketch of the human skeleton" and the boss be like "only for the books being published in these specific european countries" and then they high-five and go out for drinks

Medical illustrator:

France, Holland and Germany:

yoooo that’s Clara the rhinoceros - she was towed around Europe so much in the mid 18thc. as an exotic attraction that she became like a fad and all sorts of artists drew, painted, and sculpted her (and also randomly stuck her in the bkgds of anatomical drawings)

lol, for everyone asking about the ‘void face’ woman - she’s wearing a mask called a ‘vizard’ or ‘moretta’. they originally show up in late 16thc upper class European ladies fashion. They were worn while traveling to maintain a fashionably pale complexion, but they evolved over time to become a popular component of masquerades. 

In Venice in particular, the style lingered and became popular to wear during Carnival, or as a way for upper class women to disguise their identity so they could engage in activities that might otherwise be considered improper (gambling, flirting, or just like... going about the city without a proper chaperone) 

an interesting construction note - these masks weren’t tied on. They were made with a bead or button attached inside the mask which was held between the teeth. If a wearer wanted to speak, she would have to remove the mask. 

This was a lot of history to absorb at 1:42 am

6) have you all CONSIDERED how sexy and villainous the right mask is?????

Why the fuck are we psychoanalysing people who still want to wear masks during a pandemic because we haven't reached herd immunity instead of analyzing the people who never wore them and threw fits every chance they got

why I still wear a mask even though I’m fully vaccinated:

1) if I do wear it, it has a 0% chance of affecting me whatsoever,

2) if I don’t wear it, I have a 6% chance of getting COVID or spreading it to someone else, not to mention all other diseases that I am not vaccinated for. Because diseases other than COVID exist and can spread to other people!

3) it's still allergy season

4) other people don't know I'm vaccinated and frankly most of the people immediately throwing out their masks are probably anti maskers and anti vaxxers that are going to spread the plague and I'd rather people feel safe around me than wonder whether I'm vaccinated or if I'm a republican

5) In addition to all of the above after over a year of not getting rude and invasive comments about the fact that my facial expressions aren't proper or being called a liar when I'm not, I like my face being hidden and don't plan to stop wearing a mask because frankly no one is entitled to see my face and I like it being covered.

6.  It’s also gnat season.  You ever inhale a gnat?   Because I haven’t inhaled a gnat since summer of 2019, and we’re keeping it that way.

7. I’m in Brood X territory so I have to deal with two simultaneous plagues. last time around a cicada almost flew into my open mouth and I would do literally anything to prevent that from happening again

8) Subsection of (5) really, but with a mask on I don’t have to worry about what facial expression I have on if I accidentally make eye contact with a stranger. 

9) I can speak at what I feel is a natural volume without other people telling me I’m being Too Loud. 

10) The mask traps humidity from my exhalations against my mouth and nose, so I don’t get as many dry-air-induced bloody noses during wintertime.