Jackson’s Mask Fiasco: Mandate Caused 138% Increase In Teton County Net Cases

Summary

• Jackson town’s mask ordinance has been a total fiasco, as we now have the numbers resulting from the experiment.
• Before the July 3 mask mandate, net cases had fallen 38% from the April 9 peak. Great success!
• After the mask mandate was imposed on July 3, the numbers initially stayed flat for a few days, but then skyrocketed 138% until July 19.
• Meanwhile, Teton County’s share of Wyoming’s total net cases more than doubled from under 6% to over 12%.  So it was not like this problem was happening in the rest of Wyoming.
• We now have actual evidence of the policy, in black and white: Masks have proven to be dramatically counter-productive insofar as “cases” are concerned.

Want conclusive evidence that wearing masks increase -- not decrease -- net virus cases? Well, Teton County in Wyoming has just served up such evidence on a silver platter.

From April 9 until July 3, the number of net virus cases (gross minus recoveries and deaths) in Teton County decreased 38% -- from 34 to 21. That was when there was no mask mandate.

Then, on July 3, Jackson -- which is the main population center of Teton County -- imposed a mask mandate. If masks cause more cases, you would then expect that it would take close to six days until it would show up in the numbers.

Well, guess what? The number of net virus cases in Teton County did in fact remain at 21 -- unchanged -- for six days after the mask mandate was imposed. After July 9, however, the number of net virus cases in Teton County started to increase dramatically on a percentage basis:

Date	Teton net cases	Wyoming net cases	% of state
2020-04-03	26	125	20.80%
2020-04-05	30	150	20.00%
2020-04-07	31	159	19.50%
2020-04-09	34	159	21.38%
2020-04-12	29	160	18.13%
2020-04-14	28	152	18.42%
2020-04-15	26	148	17.57%
2020-07-03	21	343	6.12%
2020-07-09	21	364	5.77%
2020-07-10	22	371	5.93%
2020-07-11	23	382	6.02%
2020-07-12	25	389	6.43%
2020-07-14	27	383	7.05%
2020-07-16	29	379	7.65%
2020-07-17	30	372	8.06%
2020-07-18	39	390	10.00%
2020-07-19	50	401	12.47%

Data source: COVID-19 Map and Statistics - Wyoming Department of Health

As you can see in the table above, from July 9 (same net case number as July 3) until July 19, the number of net virus cases increased 138% -- from 21 to 50.

And it wasn’t like the rest of Wyoming had the same problem either. The increase in net virus cases in Wyoming as a whole during that period was only 10% -- from 364 to 401.

As a result, Teton County increased from under 6% of Wyoming’s total to over 12%. That’s more than a double. The rest of Wyoming didn’t have a mask mandate, which apparently yielded results that were more than twice as good as Teton County.

So let’s review what happened here:

1. From April 9 until July 3, the number of net virus cases in Teton County fell 38% -- from 34 to 21.

2. On July 3, Jackson -- the main part of Teton County -- imposed a mask mandate.

3. For a few days -- from July 3 to July 9 -- the number of virus cases in Teton County remained flat at 21.

4. After that, from July 9 until July 19, Teton County has seen a 138% increase in net virus cases -- from 21 to 50.

Is there any clearer evidence proving the fact that mask mandate is completely counter-productive, as far as any hopes of it reducing virus cases? We have now had an experiment in real time: First, without masks. Then with masks.

Without masks: Net cases fell 38%.

With masks: Net cases increased by 138%.

Conclusion: Do what was proven to work, from April until July 3, and avoid the fiasco that didn’t work, after July 3. Stop wearing masks.

Pickup trucks such as the ones from General Motors (GM), Ford (F) and RAM / FCA (FCAU) are more common in relatively rural Wyoming, compared to the more urban and coastal areas of the U.S.