Queensland’s chief health officer is considering the possibility of mandating face masks for children under the age of 12 as the Australian state’s biggest Covid-19 outbreak since the first wave last year grew by 16 cases on Thursday, August 5th.
Dr Jeanette Young, Queensland’s chief health officer, pointed out that the state only requires children aged 12 and above to wear face masks.
“But we are looking if it’s possible to do it for younger [people]. For a start we will have to look at different masks,” the chief health officer noted that the current face coverings are “too big” for children.
“There’s a whole range of things that we need to look at before we could do it, but yes we are definitely looking at [the possibility].”
Whilst the government is seeking to mandate masks for kids, they have chosen to ignore the evidence that shows that face coverings are neither safe nor effective. For example, results of a clinical trial that was conducted earlier this year discovered that wearing a face mask for just three minutes had “adverse effects” on children and could lead to breathing problems.
During the study, researchers measured the carbon dioxide level in inhaled air with and without two types of face coverings in a controlled and well-ventilated room, using healthy volunteer children. Researchers measured means between 13120 (384) and 13910 (374) ppm of carbon dioxide in inhaled air under surgical and filtering facepiece 2 (FFP2) masks, which researchers stated: “is higher than what has already been deemed unacceptable by the German Federal Environmental Office by a factor of 6.”
The researchers concluded that the face masks had adverse effects on the children and the effects of carbon dioxide inhalation lead to “impairments attributable to hypercapnia.” Hypercapnia is where there is too much carbon dioxide present in the bloodstream, which can cause symptoms such as dizziness, headaches, and shortness of breath.
