So, I get panic attacks when I wear a mask for more than a short period. Nothing I can do about it. I know some people can wear masks for hours at a time. One of my friends trained for a marathon wearing a KN-95 mask. (I told him he was an idiot.) Anyway, since we are Kennedy Center subscribers, and they have this stupid mandate, my solution was to, 1) wear a mask from fakemaskworldwide.com (highly recommended), but then 2) just bring the mask down below my nose after the lights went down. I was a rule follower when young, until I started meeting people who made the rules. Yet, I had been hassled about this multiple times, so I went down the rabbit hole of asking for the Kennedy Center for relief from the mandate, and offered them a letter from my doc telling them about the panic attacks, as I told my doc about them early on in this fiasco. The woman I talked to in the accessibility department was very gracious and actually offered us the President's Box instead of our tickets, but neither my wife nor I wanted to move further away from the stage, so I kept our normal seats and I continued with my rule-breaking behavior. But I asked the Kennedy Center person to get me an in-person meeting with whoever makes the decisions at the KC on the mask mandate. In response, she sent an email and I got an impersonal response, unsigned from the "KC Covid Team" saying that the KC takes their medical advice from the Cleveland Clinic and Inova, and telling me to basically go away. There the matter set for a few days while I worked until on Friday the CDC repealed the requirement for everyone to be masked in medical facilities, leaving the KC (along with the National Theater and the Shakespeare Theater) as the two remaining outposts of the mask cult in DC. So this morning, writing with the righteous fury of a scientist who knows more about science than the "scientists" who make these rules, I fired off the following email to the KC Covid Team. I will let you know if I get a response:
Hello Kennedy Center Covid Team!
As you may know, the CDC dropped mask requirements for healthcare settings last Friday:
"When SARS-CoV-2 Community Transmission levels are not high, healthcare facilities could choose not to require universal source control. [masking] … Individuals might also choose to continue using source control based on personal preference, informed by their perceived level of risk for infection based on their recent activities (e.g., attending crowded indoor gatherings with poor ventilation) and their potential for developing severe disease."
That means the Kennedy Center is the last place in the DC metropolitan area to require masks. Not the Metro. Not the Capital One Arena. Not taxis. Not government buildings. Not healthcare settings. Nowhere.
The issue I had with this policy, besides my own involuntary negative psychological reaction to wearing a mask, which Jessica informed you about already, is that fundamentally only *some* types of masks, worn properly and not touched on clean shaven faces, work to suppress the spread of respiratory viruses. SARS-CoV-2 is spread primarily by aerosols, not by droplets. This fact has been known since the first half of 2020. So unless a person has a good seal on his mask, that is tight, when he exhales the aerosols escape through the gaps at the side of the mask due to the positive pressure of the exhalation and the leaky seal around the face. On the other hand, when a person inhales, generally the seal becomes better due to the negative pressure, and the inflowing air goes through the mask. What this means is that in principle, unless a person is wearing a very tight-fitting respirator, no mask can prevent the flow of outbound virions (i.e., “protect other people”), though some masks can prevent inbound virions (“protect yourself”). This effect makes it clear that universal masking makes no sense, as none of the masks people are actually wearing in the Kennedy Center theaters actually do anything at all to prevent the outbound spread of virions.
Yet, you don’t have to trust my opinion over those of the alleged experts at the Cleveland Clinic or Inova. That is the beauty of science. Science does not consist of listening to experts. Science consists of observation and induction from data. This is why I want to meet with the KC Covid Team in person. Because in 15 minutes I can demonstrate to everyone on the team that only certain masks actually have any effect on virus transmission. That type of demonstration is what science actually consists of: people seeing things with their own eyes, or in the case of testing masks, smelling things with their own noses. I could also bring a stack of peer-reviewed medical journal articles showing that surgical masks do nothing to prevent the spread of respiratory viruses. But what would be the point of reading all that literature when I can show you in person the effect of various masks on your own faces?
The problem with the mask mandate in general is not that the people like yourselves making these decisions are not well-intentioned, but that the policy is indiscriminate. The policy is not “wear a mask that might actually work.” It’s “wear any damn thing you please on your face, even masks that are not designed to work or designed specifically not to work.” I will bring examples of both of those types of masks to the meeting to show you how nonsensical the policy is. Finally, there are many people who wear “reusable” cloth masks instead of one-time-use disposable surgical masks. These reusable cloth masks are dangerous and the Kennedy Center should not put itself in the position of advocating the use of something that may cause more illnesses, and more serious illnesses, than Covid. This phenomenon is called the “Foegen Effect.” In short, when a person experiences gastrointestinal reflux (burping or other expulsion of gases from their stomach), the material expelled, including all the gastrointestinal bacteria that would normally be subsequently exhaled from the body, are caught in the mask. The person then breathes in through the mask and these gastrointestinal bacteria—mostly harmless in the gut—then get brought into the lungs, where they don’t belong and are potentially far from harmless. This phenomenon is why doctors only use disposable masks that they keep on for no more than a few hours before discarding. A cloth mask that is not rigorously washed (with bleach or some other serious chemical) every single day will, with the moisture of a person’s exhalations keeping it moist, become a perfect breeding ground for colonies of bacteria, which are then inhaled into a person’s lungs. Yet this phenomenon, which can (and does) have a much more serious effect on some peoples’ health than Covid, is what the *Kennedy Center advocates* for its audiences. The fact that the Foegen Effect is not well known does not mean that some lawyer somewhere doesn’t know about it.
So besides the mask mandate not making any real sense for source control of viruses, like SARS-CoV-2, that are spread by aerosols, the mandate actually encourages people to engage in behavior that could seriously jeopardize their health.
I realize the whole mask thing has become a political statement more than a scientific statement. If that’s the case at the Kennedy Center, then I urge you to allow people to express their political affiliations on their faces, rather than forcing everyone to make a political statement on your behalf. At the last performance I was at (Sep 16, Dear Evan Hansen), at least 5% of the audience wasn’t wearing any mask at all after the lights dimmed anyway, so the dam is already breaking, as more and more people realize the policy makes no sense from both a medical and comfort standpoint. This is not a hill you wish to die on, especially since all you are doing is putting more stress on the poor ushers to try to implement a policy that half the audience doesn’t really want and an increasing number of them are not even bothering to adhere to anyway.
In conclusion, I have the following requests:
1) I would like to meet personally with the KC Covid Team to show you the effectiveness of various mask types using simple, easy-to-understand tests. This is actual science—observation--if you want your policy to be based on science. I can also print out and deliver to you the journal articles that demonstrate that cloth and surgical masks have no effect on the transmission of respiratory viruses.
2) I would like the names and contact information for the individuals at Cleveland Clinic and Inova whose opinions you are using to base your mask policy on, because I intend to request in-person interviews with them as well. I have a feeling they’ve never done simple in-person experiments either, and are just parroting the CDC. If that’s the case, then, well, the CDC just changed its guidelines, so these alleged experts should change their opinions as well.
Please let me know what day is convenient for you to meet. And thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain my position.
I am delighted you enjoyed the production. I'm happy you acquired your tickets the way you did. You probably know my opinion of the face diapers. I have not seen many theatre productions in my 56 years on the planet. However I would view Riverdance in person if I could. Fine arts... unfortunately I believe I lack culture. I am more savage. Oh well. I even have yet to view the Nutcracker show. I guess I am medieval in nature
The BEST show period! In Chicago we had an amazing ensemble. I saw them twice, and of course watched the original cast on Disney+. I was just listening to the soundtrack this weekend. I am super happy you won the lottery for them. I hope you get to go again! Thank you for sharing your ’hack’
I saw Hamilton when it first arrived in Washington. It was awhile ago. Overall I enjoy the performing arts. The music, costumes and choreography were beautiful. But the story of Alexander Hamilton and the founding of our country is a bit lost in the play. I also remember feeling confused trying to follow the story line.
As I said, I really do like the performing arts so I’m going to be looking into Lucky Seats. Thanks Emily
So, I get panic attacks when I wear a mask for more than a short period. Nothing I can do about it. I know some people can wear masks for hours at a time. One of my friends trained for a marathon wearing a KN-95 mask. (I told him he was an idiot.) Anyway, since we are Kennedy Center subscribers, and they have this stupid mandate, my solution was to, 1) wear a mask from fakemaskworldwide.com (highly recommended), but then 2) just bring the mask down below my nose after the lights went down. I was a rule follower when young, until I started meeting people who made the rules. Yet, I had been hassled about this multiple times, so I went down the rabbit hole of asking for the Kennedy Center for relief from the mandate, and offered them a letter from my doc telling them about the panic attacks, as I told my doc about them early on in this fiasco. The woman I talked to in the accessibility department was very gracious and actually offered us the President's Box instead of our tickets, but neither my wife nor I wanted to move further away from the stage, so I kept our normal seats and I continued with my rule-breaking behavior. But I asked the Kennedy Center person to get me an in-person meeting with whoever makes the decisions at the KC on the mask mandate. In response, she sent an email and I got an impersonal response, unsigned from the "KC Covid Team" saying that the KC takes their medical advice from the Cleveland Clinic and Inova, and telling me to basically go away. There the matter set for a few days while I worked until on Friday the CDC repealed the requirement for everyone to be masked in medical facilities, leaving the KC (along with the National Theater and the Shakespeare Theater) as the two remaining outposts of the mask cult in DC. So this morning, writing with the righteous fury of a scientist who knows more about science than the "scientists" who make these rules, I fired off the following email to the KC Covid Team. I will let you know if I get a response:
Hello Kennedy Center Covid Team!
As you may know, the CDC dropped mask requirements for healthcare settings last Friday:
https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20220928/cdc:-masking-no-longer-required-in-health-care-settings
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/infection-control-recommendations.html
"When SARS-CoV-2 Community Transmission levels are not high, healthcare facilities could choose not to require universal source control. [masking] … Individuals might also choose to continue using source control based on personal preference, informed by their perceived level of risk for infection based on their recent activities (e.g., attending crowded indoor gatherings with poor ventilation) and their potential for developing severe disease."
That means the Kennedy Center is the last place in the DC metropolitan area to require masks. Not the Metro. Not the Capital One Arena. Not taxis. Not government buildings. Not healthcare settings. Nowhere.
The issue I had with this policy, besides my own involuntary negative psychological reaction to wearing a mask, which Jessica informed you about already, is that fundamentally only *some* types of masks, worn properly and not touched on clean shaven faces, work to suppress the spread of respiratory viruses. SARS-CoV-2 is spread primarily by aerosols, not by droplets. This fact has been known since the first half of 2020. So unless a person has a good seal on his mask, that is tight, when he exhales the aerosols escape through the gaps at the side of the mask due to the positive pressure of the exhalation and the leaky seal around the face. On the other hand, when a person inhales, generally the seal becomes better due to the negative pressure, and the inflowing air goes through the mask. What this means is that in principle, unless a person is wearing a very tight-fitting respirator, no mask can prevent the flow of outbound virions (i.e., “protect other people”), though some masks can prevent inbound virions (“protect yourself”). This effect makes it clear that universal masking makes no sense, as none of the masks people are actually wearing in the Kennedy Center theaters actually do anything at all to prevent the outbound spread of virions.
Yet, you don’t have to trust my opinion over those of the alleged experts at the Cleveland Clinic or Inova. That is the beauty of science. Science does not consist of listening to experts. Science consists of observation and induction from data. This is why I want to meet with the KC Covid Team in person. Because in 15 minutes I can demonstrate to everyone on the team that only certain masks actually have any effect on virus transmission. That type of demonstration is what science actually consists of: people seeing things with their own eyes, or in the case of testing masks, smelling things with their own noses. I could also bring a stack of peer-reviewed medical journal articles showing that surgical masks do nothing to prevent the spread of respiratory viruses. But what would be the point of reading all that literature when I can show you in person the effect of various masks on your own faces?
The problem with the mask mandate in general is not that the people like yourselves making these decisions are not well-intentioned, but that the policy is indiscriminate. The policy is not “wear a mask that might actually work.” It’s “wear any damn thing you please on your face, even masks that are not designed to work or designed specifically not to work.” I will bring examples of both of those types of masks to the meeting to show you how nonsensical the policy is. Finally, there are many people who wear “reusable” cloth masks instead of one-time-use disposable surgical masks. These reusable cloth masks are dangerous and the Kennedy Center should not put itself in the position of advocating the use of something that may cause more illnesses, and more serious illnesses, than Covid. This phenomenon is called the “Foegen Effect.” In short, when a person experiences gastrointestinal reflux (burping or other expulsion of gases from their stomach), the material expelled, including all the gastrointestinal bacteria that would normally be subsequently exhaled from the body, are caught in the mask. The person then breathes in through the mask and these gastrointestinal bacteria—mostly harmless in the gut—then get brought into the lungs, where they don’t belong and are potentially far from harmless. This phenomenon is why doctors only use disposable masks that they keep on for no more than a few hours before discarding. A cloth mask that is not rigorously washed (with bleach or some other serious chemical) every single day will, with the moisture of a person’s exhalations keeping it moist, become a perfect breeding ground for colonies of bacteria, which are then inhaled into a person’s lungs. Yet this phenomenon, which can (and does) have a much more serious effect on some peoples’ health than Covid, is what the *Kennedy Center advocates* for its audiences. The fact that the Foegen Effect is not well known does not mean that some lawyer somewhere doesn’t know about it.
So besides the mask mandate not making any real sense for source control of viruses, like SARS-CoV-2, that are spread by aerosols, the mandate actually encourages people to engage in behavior that could seriously jeopardize their health.
I realize the whole mask thing has become a political statement more than a scientific statement. If that’s the case at the Kennedy Center, then I urge you to allow people to express their political affiliations on their faces, rather than forcing everyone to make a political statement on your behalf. At the last performance I was at (Sep 16, Dear Evan Hansen), at least 5% of the audience wasn’t wearing any mask at all after the lights dimmed anyway, so the dam is already breaking, as more and more people realize the policy makes no sense from both a medical and comfort standpoint. This is not a hill you wish to die on, especially since all you are doing is putting more stress on the poor ushers to try to implement a policy that half the audience doesn’t really want and an increasing number of them are not even bothering to adhere to anyway.
In conclusion, I have the following requests:
1) I would like to meet personally with the KC Covid Team to show you the effectiveness of various mask types using simple, easy-to-understand tests. This is actual science—observation--if you want your policy to be based on science. I can also print out and deliver to you the journal articles that demonstrate that cloth and surgical masks have no effect on the transmission of respiratory viruses.
2) I would like the names and contact information for the individuals at Cleveland Clinic and Inova whose opinions you are using to base your mask policy on, because I intend to request in-person interviews with them as well. I have a feeling they’ve never done simple in-person experiments either, and are just parroting the CDC. If that’s the case, then, well, the CDC just changed its guidelines, so these alleged experts should change their opinions as well.
Please let me know what day is convenient for you to meet. And thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain my position.
--Ed.
Happy for you that you had the opportunity.
Science is relative to location, I guess 🤦🏻♂️😂
You are so BLESSED !
Live theater with a LIVE orchestra and sitting on the SECOND row !
You are so BLESSED !
Was I asleep in elementary school? Because I never heard of Founding Father John Hamilton, only Alexander. Please fill me in!
Amazing!👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
Very good. You didn't tell us who got your second ticket!
I am delighted you enjoyed the production. I'm happy you acquired your tickets the way you did. You probably know my opinion of the face diapers. I have not seen many theatre productions in my 56 years on the planet. However I would view Riverdance in person if I could. Fine arts... unfortunately I believe I lack culture. I am more savage. Oh well. I even have yet to view the Nutcracker show. I guess I am medieval in nature
The BEST show period! In Chicago we had an amazing ensemble. I saw them twice, and of course watched the original cast on Disney+. I was just listening to the soundtrack this weekend. I am super happy you won the lottery for them. I hope you get to go again! Thank you for sharing your ’hack’
I saw Hamilton when it first arrived in Washington. It was awhile ago. Overall I enjoy the performing arts. The music, costumes and choreography were beautiful. But the story of Alexander Hamilton and the founding of our country is a bit lost in the play. I also remember feeling confused trying to follow the story line.
As I said, I really do like the performing arts so I’m going to be looking into Lucky Seats. Thanks Emily