We were originally told that masks do not help stop the spread of the virus in any significant way, and in fact, may be harmful. Two months later we were then told that masks actually do significantly limit the spread of the virus, and the excuse for the original position is that we simply didn't want people to diminish the medical establishment's mask supply, and/or that we somehow didn't actually understand how this particular coronavirus spreads since it's "novel". We are given this outlandish excuse, despite the fact that the fundamentals of disease transmission applies to all coronaviruses, novel or not.