Spread of face masks a window on humanity

House keys, wallet or purse, mobile phone and ... oh, yes: face mask.

Reluctantly for many, but also inexorably in the face of a deadly invisible enemy, small rectangles of flimsy yet life-saving tissue have in mere months joined the list of don’t-leave-homewithout-them items for billions around the world.

Not since humans invented shoes or underwear has a single item of dress caught on so widely and quickly from Melbourne to Mexico City, Beijing to Bordeaux, spanning borders, cultures, generations and sexes with almost the same Earth-shaking speed as the coronavirus that has killed more than 600,000 and infected more than 15 million.

“There has, perhaps, never been such a rapid and dramatic change in global human behavior,“says Jeremy Howard, cofounder of #Masks4All, a pro-mask lobbying group. “Humanity should be patting itself on the back.”

But rarely, also maybe never, has anything else worn by humans sparked such furious discord and politicking, most notably in the United States. Did anyone on an American beach ever pull a gun on someone for wearing a bikini, as an unmasked man did on a masked shopper this month at a Florida Walmart?

As such, like other human habits, the mask has become a mirror on humanity. That so many people, with varying degrees of zeal, have adapted to the discomfort of masking their airways and facial expressions is powerful medicine for the belief that people are fundamentally caring, capable of sacrifice for the common good.

From Marsha Dita, a social media freelancer in Jakarta, Indonesia, comes a view succinctly put, and increasingly widely shared: “This is not the time to be selfish.”

Yet also apparent from outbreaks of fierce resistance to masks, especially in democracies, is this: Plenty of people don’t like being told what to do and distrust the scientific evidence that masks curb contamination.

Cries that masks muzzle freedom have been vociferously aired at rallies in the United States, Canada and, last Sunday, in London. There, a speaker at a protest against the introduction this Friday of mandatory mask-wearing in Britain’s stores argued: “People die every year. This is nothing new.“

Skepticism shared by, among others, Mohammed al-Burji, a 42-year-old civil servant in Lebanon. Walking

to work without a mask, violating laxly enforced rules that they be worn everywhere outside the home, he said: “There is no coronavirus, brother. They’re just deceiving people.”

The country has reported over 3,100 infections and 43 deaths, and senior officials have made public appeals for people to stick to mask wearing and social distancing.

The same human reflexes that cause people to size up each other’s fashion choices, haircuts and alike on first meeting are now instinctively applied to masks, too.

In Mexico City, Estima Mendoza says she cannot help but recoil at people without masks. “I feel defenseless. On one hand I judge them and on the other I ask myself ‘Why?” Mendoza said. “As human beings, we always judge.”

As a Black Muslim woman in France, Maria Dabo knows that feeling all too well. For her, the adoption of masks has had an unexpected but welcome side effect: She no longer feels such a standout in the country that has legislated to prevent Muslim women from wearing face-covering veils. With masks required in all indoor public spaces, the French far-right’s long obsession with Islamic veils has been muted.

“I feel like we are a bit better understood,” Dabo said. “Everyone is obliged to do the same as us, which makes me believe that God is busy teaching people a lesson, that covering up isn’t religious or anything else. It’s about not being a fool and protecting oneself.”

Also muddying and fueling global debate has been mixed messaging from government leaders who flip-flopped on the utility of masks and advised against their public use when stocks were so lacking that health workers cared for the sick and dying without adequate protection.

Chief among the U-turners is U.S. President Donald Trump, who first wore a mask in public only after COVID-19 had killed at least 134,000 Americans and tweeted this week that mask-wearing is a patriotic act.

Months of resistance preceded that tweet — resistance that causes headscratching in autocratic China, which has quashed debate about how the pandemic started and was handled there.

“People in other countries ask for freedom. But they are actually losing it, because they have seen a rapid increase in infected cases,” said Liu Yanhua, an insurance worker.

Associated Press Nantaga Sanguannoi during her evening walk at Lumpini park Bangkok, Thailand, on Tuesday. Sanguannoi works as a registered nurse in a hospital in Bangkok. “I want everyone to know it is easy to prevent spreading of COVID-19 by wearing a mask.”