Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,
A doctor who advised President Joe Biden on COVID-19 warned Dr. Anthony Fauci and other top Biden administration officials in a newly disclosed text message that wearing cloth masks provided “very limited protection.”
Dr. Michael Osterholm, who was part of Biden’s COVID-19 transition advisory team, told Fauci and other officials, including the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention at the time, in August 2021, that the government needed to encourage the wearing of N-95 masks, rather than masking in general.
“Note the very limited protection from face cloth coverings,” Osterholm said in the text. He said that he supported masking, “but we must be promoting the use of N-95s, even if not fit tested.”
The CDC recommended masking in 2020 after the COVID-19 pandemic started, prompting mask mandates in schools and other places. The agency promoted cloth masks, in addition to better quality face coverings, citing research it published in its quasi-journal.
Osterholm, the director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, leading up to the 2021 text said publicly that cloth masks provided limited benefits and that he favored N-95s.
After Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis threatened to withhold funds from schools that forced masking on children, a reporter during a White House press briefing on Aug. 6, 2021,
