In an interview, Saphier says that "parents and children have been traumatized by fear-based tactics manipulating data."

"The bottom line is, there are no good, quality data showing cloth masks in schools offer any benefit,” she says. “The science on masks has not changed. There has never been reliable data supporting mask mandates in schools to lessen the already low risk in the lowest-risk population.”.

What has changed, she says, " is there is now a less severe variant circulating, and the majority of children have some level of vaccine, natural or combination hybrid immunity."