On July 3, 2020, Kansas passed a statewide mask mandate. 81 counties opted out, as the state constitution allows, while 24 counties kept it in place. The counties that opted out were predominantly rural and although the 24 counties that kept them were greatly out numbered by those opting out they none-the-less accounted for a majority of the population. As the Alpha variant wave swept over the country and Kansas, this disparity in mask mandates by closely situated counties offered an opportunity to gauge the effect of masking.
Prior to the the mask mandate the infection rate across Kansas was roughly the same. With the Alpha wave surge across Kansas, two months of data show a 6% decline in infections in the 24 counties. So despite the unrelenting tide of the wave, the counties with mask mandates actually enjoyed a slight improvement. But how did the 81 counties do during that same period? The data reveals they suffered a 100% increase in infections. These percentages are related to per 100,000 Jayhawkers, not raw numbers.
Case closed, you might be tempted to say, but the Show Me State of Missouri wasn’t convinced.
A year later, in July 2021, the Delta waves washed across the country and Missouri. On July 19, St. Louis and St. Louis County both declared mask mandates, and Kansas City and Jackson County followed soon after. The rest of the state had none. Again, scientists and Doctors were given a study opportunity with a control group they didn’t ask for.
Before the Delta wave hit, COVID rates were about equal across the state. But the curves started to diverge after the mandates went into effect. The rate of increase in new cases began to taper off in masked jurisdictions while the rate in unmasked areas continued rising before finally peaking in mid-August.
The analysis spanned a longer timeframe consisting of the end of April 2021, just before Delta was detected in the state, to the end of October 2021, just before the Governor’s office requested the data. In that time, the average case rate in masked jurisdictions was 27 percent lower—15.8 cases per day per 100,000 residents compared with 21.7 cases per day per 100,000 residents. Death rates were similarly lower, with 0.2 per 100,000 Missourians per day in masked communities versus 0.28 per 100,000 Missourians per day in unmasked communities.
Sadly, the outcome of the Missouri study, requested by the Governor’s office, was not published and it was not revealed until a Sunshine Law request forced it. Gov. Parson has railed against masks in the past. And despite the new evidence, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt is continuing his lawsuits against St. Louis, St. Louis County, Kansas City, and Jackson County over their mask mandates, which he calls “arbitrary, capricious, unlawful, and unconstitutional.” I guess the Governor’s mansion is situated in the “Don’t Show Me State” and the AG firmly adheres to the “until it directly impacts me or my nuclear family it doesn’t count” premise. Neither one of them was willing to apply the knowledge painfully gained through excess deaths revealed in the Kansas studies to inform and protect the people of Missouri.
If your Governor or county authority or Mayor hesitates or vacillates on masking, social distancing, and other proven mitigations, call them out and vote them out.
References:
Kansas: www.npr.org/…
Missouri: news.stlpublicradio.org/...