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Why Some Americans Resist Wearing Face Masks

Deborah Block

   ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA - At a grocery store in Alexandria, Virginia,
   customer Laura Schafor was dismayed about a couple who weren't wearing
   masks and were about to enter the store.

   "They put the rest of us in danger of getting the coronavirus," she
   said.

   Another customer, Joshua Wright, wasn't concerned, saying, "I don't
   know anybody who has gotten sick with the virus. If I get it, I get
   it."

   Wright, 28, said he only started wearing a face covering after the
   state of Virginia on Friday began mandating that people must wear masks
   inside public buildings and businesses.

   The problem with "'I'm young, I'm healthy, I don't care if I get
   infected,' is that even with mild or no symptoms, young, healthy people
   can be a very important part of the chain of transmission to other
   people" of all different ages," Dr. David Aronoff, director of
   infectious diseases at Vanderbilt Medical Center in Nashville,
   Tennessee, said.

   Aronoff said some people still haven't gotten the message that "my
   breath can be lethal to another person" and that wearing a mask makes a
   difference in helping to stop the transmission of the disease.

   With more than 100,000 people who have died from COVID-19, the United
   States has the highest death toll of any country in the world.

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