At a Waterville City Council meeting yesterday, Nick Isgro, Mayor and Vice Chair of the Maine Republican Party, cited “conflicting medical evidence” of face masks despite the “overwhelming consensus” among public health experts that face masks can slow the spread of the coronavirus.
This is just the latest example of Republicans hindering the coronavirus response, even as US CDC Director Robert Redfield said in an interview last week that “we could bring this epidemic under control” in two months if everyone wore a mask. Isgro’s public questioning of face masks comes on the heels of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci imploring local and state officials to “be as forceful as possible” on mask wearing to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
While Isgro, who is not a public health expert, claimed that cloth masks could have “zero effect”, other council members cited Maine CDC Director Dr. Nirav Shah on the merits of wearing masks to protect others and reducing “the risk that the virus could spread.” At a recent briefing, Dr. Shah explained that "a face covering is at minimum what we owe to one another” in an ongoing pandemic, a stark contrast to Isgro’s dangerous spread of disinformation.
“As the Vice Chair of the Maine Republican Party uses his platform as Mayor of Waterville to spread disinformation, public experts from Dr. Shah to Dr. Fauci agree that face masks are important in slowing the spread of the coronavirus,” said Lisa Roberts, Executive Director of the Maine Democratic Party. “Let’s be clear. Nick Isgro is not a public health expert. His refusal to follow the lead of public health experts is both dangerous and threatens to reverse the good work our leaders here in Maine have done to keep us safe and healthy.”
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