In the early days of the pandemic, I advocated for a temporary shutdown that I believed was necessary to prevent the healthcare system from collapsing. I also supported the widespread use of masks indoors because I believed they were better than nothing. Both of these opinions were based on the scant knowledge we had at the time and the concern that we would not be well equipped to fight this virus.

But now we know two things for sure: The shutdown, which went from 14 days to several months, did a lot more harm than good, and the cloth masks that the vast majority of people use are barely better than useless. These were not solutions; they were Band-Aids, and we should not accept the reimposition of impractical restrictions when the only real solution, the vaccine, has been available to everyone for months.