What are we doing to our Children ? 7
Education and socialisation can’t happen behind a mask. Belfast Newsletter
Unhealthy, immoral, ineffective and inhumane: Why are we masking schoolchildren?
Face masks in the classroom are an insult to children pronounced the Daily Telegraph and indeed they are. Masking Children is tragic, unscientific, and damaging, according to the American Institute of Economic Research.
The proposal that our children cover their noses and mouths for 6/7 hours per day whilst at school, including in the classroom is inhumane, abusive, unnecessary and educationally destructive. It is self evidently unhygienic.
Current German research noted that there is no manufacturer independent studies confirming the benefit of masks for children and adolescents .
There is, however, plenty of science which has confirmed the harmful physical, psychological and behavioural effects -worryingly the same German report indicated that the harms may be far more widespread than previously reported.
Whilst the Director of the London Neurology and Pain Clinic, Dr Maragreta Griesz-Brisson “To deprive a child’s brain of oxygen, or even just to restrict it (by mask wearing) is absolutely criminal. The damage because of it cannot be reversed…. this measure should not be allowed.”
There is plenty of research confirming that children, should they catch it, are almost totally unaffected by the virus.
And that their teachers are no more affected than the general public (Office of National Statistics))
And that their parents are also almost completely unaffected, with Professor John Ioannidis, Professor of Epidemiology and Statistics at Stanford university placing the probability of survival for people under 70 after infection at 99.95%.
And the N. Ireland Public Health Agency reports that that schools are not major sources of transmission.
Furthermore the world’s leading scientists state that asymptomatic transmission is insignificant or zero.
So why are we persisting in an ineffective and unnecessary policy?
Education and the socialisation aspects of it cannot take place behind a mask.
Education requires unimpeded visual and oral communication. Good teaching involves a variety of teaching strategies to take account of the different learning styles of pupils, some learn best by doing, some by looking, some by listening. It involves interactivity, group work, team work, discussion, detailed complex explanation-imagine a question and answer session or a drama or a reading or a language lesson or a poetry reading or oracy or a role play session or a singing lesson with a mask. Do we not value choirs, drama productions, sport ?-these all play an important part in children’s education. The important engagement with outside agents-authors, sports coaches, careers officers, counsellors, translators, actors, artists is also impossible. Masks render all of this impossible. This is not school.
Children with Special Educational Needs and children who are challenged by education require personal contact with their teacher, for many, facial expressions provide reinforcement and visual clues are vital.
Teachers often assess the degree of understanding of their teaching from the facial expressions of their pupils, thus leading to better targeted teaching teaching. Expressions are essential too to gauge emotions and for teachers to detect essential non verbal communication around deep feelings.
In addition to the loss of learning and reduction in teaching quality, there are the negative effects. In the German study, the most frequently reported side effects of masks were irritability, headaches, difficulty concentrating, less cheerfulness, impairment of learning, fatigue, inability to sleep, and anxiety—is this the price for going back to school?
In Sweden the Public Health Agency’s standpoint is “Children are not the drivers [of infection] in this epidemic”.
“the benefit of masks is not large enough to outweigh the downside of reduced learning and communication in the classroom.”
The UN Convention of Human Rights of the Child “in all actions concerning children…undertaken by public institutions…the best interests of the child shall be the primary consideration “
We are not doing this-we are not putting the rights and needs of the children first.
This is a disgraceful abuse of power against a sector of our society with no power to resist.
It is time to unmask.