Psychologist Dr Gary Sidley presents many personal testimonies to the negative consequences of extraordinary restrictions and practices during the covid event. Generalised descriptions often fail to impress upon the reader the extent of suffering and turmoil endured by the victims of these draconian interventions. Accounts from the Scottish Covid Inquiry (SCI) and other sources convey the depth of emotional impact of these impositions upon ordinary people.
Masks
The Curse of Masks in Health and Social Care:
Why are some care homes still restricting visitors and insisting on mask wearing? Have the elderly residents not suffered enough? This article includes testimony from the Scottish Covid Inquiry.
Pick of the Week: 29/03/2024
This week’s selection of articles 🔗 The Curious Case of Hydroxychloroquine: Professor Robert Clancy, Quadrant Online, 5th March 2024 This article is based on a talk Robert Clancy gave at a conference entitled “Medicine at the Crossroads in the Covid Era”. In seeking for a theme for his talk he decided, “few topics could be […]
Letter to CMO & Chief Scientist
No masks in secondary schools Masking is not normal and should not be normalised Saturday 8th August 2020 Dear Professor Whitty & Professor Vallance, I am writing to you both urgently on behalf of an extremely concerned group of parents, grandparents and teachers, following the announcement today that the Irish government have recommended face masks for both […]
The pro-mask eccentrics are squealing again
It’s that season again. As we wave goodbye to summer and enter the coughs-and-cold season – where sniffles are, inevitably, more common – the usual pro-mask suspects are, once again squealing for our attention.
Boris Johnson ‘nudged’ by his own advisor
In a recent article in The Telegraph, Professor David Halpern (chief executive of the Behavioural Insights Team, the UK’s ‘Nudge Unit’) described how he had successfully used a covert psychological strategy to persuade the then prime minister,
NHS cites a computer-modelling study to justify ongoing mask requirements
In a sane world, the legitimacy of using computer modelling as a rationale for imposing covid restrictions would be seriously questioned. In 2020, Professor Neil Ferguson (an epidemiologist at University College London) gained notoriety for his doomsday prediction that 2.2 million Americans and 500,000 British people could die as a direct consequence of the novel SARS-CoV-2 virus. These wildly inaccurate prophesies were largely responsible for spooking governments into imposing ineffective and hugely damaging lockdowns and, subsequently, the modelling methodology was heavily criticised.
The facts about mask requirements
This might come as a surprise to those working in healthcare, but since 27th January 2022, there has been no legal requirement to wear a mask or face covering in any healthcare setting in England. The other devolved nations have also followed suit. So why are NHS trusts and care homes still insisting on this?
Masks in NHS Campaign
Irrespective of setting, masking healthy people does more harm than good. Yet much of the NHS persists with the expectation that everybody (staff, patients and visitors) should continue to wear a face covering in their hospitals, health centres and GP practices.
The relaxation of the mask requirement in healthcare settings
On the 1st of June 2022, NHS England issued further guidance regarding the use of face masks in clinical settings. In what could be – optimistically – construed as further progress towards the Government’s ‘Living with covid’ goal, this latest official briefing directs hospitals and other care settings to end the requirement for staff, patients and visitors to wear face coverings in most wards and departments.
Masks do more harm than good
Whilst masks are a successful psychological tool to remind the public to remain alert, they are not effective in preventing the community spread of disease.
Universal masking – is it still lurking around the corner?
HART member Gary Sidley has written numerous articles on the imposition of masking for the general public, despite poor evidence that masks work and plenty of evidence of harm.
Why are healthcare venues persisting with masks?
The evidence that masking healthy people in community settings reduces viral transmission is – at best – weak and contradictory. In light of this lack of empirical support for the effectiveness of face coverings, together with the multiple harms associated with them, HART welcomes the lifting of all mask mandates in the UK.
Have face masks reduced covid cases?
Mask mandates in high-school age children were continued in Scotland in the Autumn 2021 school term. At the same time in England, masks were made optional. We can compare the difference in case counts in both countries and see the effect of this difference in policy.
How Confident is the Government in its ‘Evidence’ on Masks
It would seem that Nadhim Zahawi’s most recent promised ‘material’ evidence for his recommendations for face coverings in secondary classrooms is as flimsy as some of the cloth masks our teenagers will need to resort to using.
Mask mandates: bad and harmful
With regards further mask mandates, inaction is infinitely more rational than action.
Can a Trauma Informed Approach and adherence to COVID-19 guidelines ethically co-exist?
Can a trauma informed approach and adherence to COVID Guidelines Ethically co-exist?
Drop the mask and be a force for good
22 July 2021 – An important contribution to getting our lives back to some form of much-needed normality.
