Fauci: Mask-Wearing May Never Go Away for Good

Fauci said Americans might want to wear masks forever since doing so could potentially mitigate the seasonal flu. For the record, never leaving your house could potentially reduce your chances of getting hit by a car, but no one would consider that a useful health tip.

“I think people have gotten used to the fact that wearing masks — clearly if you look at the data — diminishes respiratory diseases,” he said. “We’ve had practically a non-existent flu season this year, merely because people were doing the kinds of public health things that were directed predominantly against COVID-19.”

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases continued: “The Australians during their winter, same thing, they had almost no flu largely due to the kinds of things including mask-wearing.

“So it is conceivable that as we go on a year or two or more from now — that during certain seasonal periods when you have respiratory-borne viruses like the flu — people might actually elect to wear masks to diminish the likelihood that you’ll spread these respiratory-borne diseases.”