Before every fashion retailer was selling their own cloth face covering, before a piece of fabric over your nose and mouth became a personal political statement, and before Goldman Sachs was saying a national face mask mandate is as good as a lockdown, Lara Martin was unsure whether homemade cloth masks were even a good idea.
The executive director of the United Methodist Committee on Relief, Martin was one of the people I interviewed back in March for a story about the science of masks. Back then, I found that masks were an excellent example of the scientific uncertainties swirling around the novel coronavirus. Remember, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the surgeon general once told the general public not to wear masks. The data that existed on mask effectiveness largely dealt with medical respirators and surgical masks. It wasn’t clear how protective a cloth mask would be, and Martin worried that wearing masks might lead people to feel more safe than they actually were — and make choices that increased their risk of contracting or transmitting COVID-19.
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