Now Even the WHO Is Saying You Shouldn't Wear a Mask in Public All the Time

As political forces in the United States push for strict mask mandates to fight the spread of the coronavirus, new guidance issued by the World Health Organization undermines the left’s claim that people must be forced to wear the protective equipment in public.

The WHO posted the updated recommendations in a Wednesday tweet.

This most recent change, which outlines when people should not wear a mask in public, follows months of inconsistent information from the group about face coverings.

“People should NOT wear masks when exercising,” the WHO’s update reads, “as masks may reduce the ability to breathe comfortably.”

When wet with sweat, the organization explained, masks become more difficult to breathe through. It said unmasked people should keep a distance of “at least one meter” from others while exercising.

In other words, the globe’s top health organization is OK with maskless people being about 3 feet apart in public — something that is now against the law in Washington state.

Of course, Democratic leaders can’t shoulder all the blame for this one, no matter how much we want them to.

World and local leaders could only make decisions based on the information they have, and for many of them, some of this expert knowledge came from the WHO’s disastrously inconsistent guidelines.

“If you are healthy,” the organization wrote in February, “you only need to wear a mask if you are taking care of a person with suspected [COVID-19] infection.”

We now know that protective masks are an important piece of the puzzle in smashing the spread of the virus. 

In late May, more than two months after the WHO declared a global pandemic, it was still recommending that only the sick and those taking care of the infected should wear masks.

As hotspots formed around the world and domestic cases neared 2 million in early June, the WHO issued an apparent reversal of its previous position. 

“In light of evolving evidence,” WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said last month, “WHO advises that governments should encourage the general public to wear masks where there is widespread transmission and physical distancing is difficult, such as on public transport, in shops or in other confined or crowded environments.”

Considering the organization’s flip-flopping on the issue of masks, there’s no telling where “evolving evidence” will lead us in the future.

If there’s one that has become apparent during this pandemic, it’s that the WHO failed the world with its ineptitude and favoritism toward China.

Even now, the global health group is unable to make a consistent recommendation on the seemingly simple subject of face coverings.

It appears as though the WHO isn’t quite the corps of experts and policymakers Democrats seem to think it is.