Kansas counties with Covid mask mandates had significantly higher case fatality rates than counties with no mandates.
That’s the conclusion of a study published in Medicine on the effect mandatory mask requirements had on case fatality rates in Kansas between August 1st and October 15th, 2020.
The author of the study, German doctor Zacharias Foegen, explains why the Sunflower State was a unique case study:
“The state of Kansas, USA, has over 2.8 million residents. During the summer of 2020, Kansas State issued a mask mandate, but it allowed its 105 counties to either opt out or issue their own mask mandate – which was a rarity in the USA and one reason for the choice of this state, the other being that the comparison of infection rates among these counties has already been done by Van Dyke et al., showing a benefit of mask mandates.”
The physician’s eponymous “Foegen Effect” theory states:
“Deep re-inhalation of hypercondensed droplets or pure virions caught in facemasks as droplets can worsen prognosis and might be linked to long-term effects of COVID-19 infection. While the “Foegen effect” is proven in vivo in an animal model, further research is needed to fully understand it.”
The study’s conclusion:
“The most important finding from this study is that contrary to the accepted thought that fewer people are dying because infection rates are reduced by masks, this was not the case. Results from this study strongly suggest that mask mandates actually caused about 1.5 times the number of deaths or 50% more deaths compared to no mask mandates.”
Dr. Aaron Kheriaty agrees with the study’s findings in an article published on Townhall.com:
”There is emerging evidence, a study out of Kansas recently that suggested that the case fatality rate with Covid is higher where there are mask mandates,” Kheriaty said. “Once you get infected, if you are wearing a mask, this study suggested that your chance of having a bad outcome, of dying from Covid was higher. And that probably has to do with rebreathing these kind of condensed droplets that have a lot of virus in them.”
A Sentinel analysis also found that Kansas counties with mask mandates had higher COVID case growth.
Townhall.com reporter Scott Morefield succinctly summarizes the conclusion of the Kansas study:
”Of course, those of us with a lick of common sense and the ability to follow evolving data knew this the entire time. Still, it’s nice to see the research finally beginning to catch up.”
