>>it will affect many more kids, and otherwise unlikely events will become common. Ignoring the risk is foolish.

It will affect many more kids, yes, and then they will be immune, and subsequent infections, if they occur, will be even milder.

The virus is not going away. Even near total vaccination does not end its transmission in the population:

https://twitter.com/eliaseythorsson/status/14240115421950238...

So barring every one living in bubbles for the rest of their life, every one will be infected by it at least once. Masking at best just delays the inevitable, for a virus which poses an extremely low risk to children who have already seen their lives disrupted for a year and a half in this over-reaction.

>>Schools are already known to be a large vector for airborne diseases,

Children shouldn't be burdened with continuous masking to protect adults. Moreover, children are not major vectors of transmission:

https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/147/4/e202004...

>>Against this, you posit some hypothetical emotional harm to children of wearing masks.

I never said anything about "emotional harm". I said it would interfere with the development of communication skills, because it obstructs non-verbal communication cues like facial expressions.

>>This is absurd on its face, but we'll discuss it.

This - trying to gaslight people into thinking their extremely legitimate concern is 'absurd' - is not an appropriate way for you to debate and attempt to push your agenda.

If you want to talk about absurd, it's you comparing one day of Halloween mask-wearing a year, to continuous mask-wearing for every school day of the year.

>>About masks in general, there are many other professions that wear them all day, not only physicians whom you glibly dismiss. I've read countless physicaian/nurse/HC accounts mentioning wearing masks all day.

They don't wear masks all day on a regular basis though. I did not "glibly dismiss" physicians. I pointed out that they do not wear masks all day on any regular basis.

I also pointed out that they are adults and have already had normal childhoods without their faces being covered.

>>consider the Inuit, who wear coverings face coverings for long periods daily almost from birth, barely exposing their eyes.

Do you have a source on Inuit wearing face coverings indoors? And I don't see why, even if it were true of Inuit children that their faces are covered for most of their childhood, you'd assume it doesn't harm their development of communication skills.

>>Humans are the most adaptable species on the planet, and children are the most adaptable among us.

Glibly dismissing the harm to communication skills, from not being able to use facial expressions, with over-confident proclomations of the human ability to adapt, is reckless.

EDIT, I'm being rate limited so I'll respond to the below here:

>>... you post nothing but frantic rationalizations ... to put the cart before the horse, the secondary issue before the primary

The evidence I provided shows that the response you are advocating, of masking all children all school year, is disproportionate to the risk covid poses to children. You seem to be emotionally wedded to a position and not able to process arguments against it in a rational way.

>>People who wear face coverings learn to communicate better with their eyes,

Source on this being an equal substitute to facial expressions?

The burden of proof is on you to show that forcing children to use substitutes wouldn't be harmful to communication and social development.

>>and the kids are not in school every day all day. They don't have parrnts, siblings, friends at home?

School is where children engage in much of their socialization, if not most of it. And they're now being required to mask with their friends outside of school too, so that exacerbates whatever harm masking does.

>>Meanwhile you glibly dismiss actual data and a disease that is already (pre-Delta) in the top 10 causes of child death, nevermind other ongoing effects, and knock-on infections.

Which data am I dismissing? Can you provide it?