I agree that we shouldn't be taking the supply away from the professionals while there's a shortage, but your statement was that they were ineffective in the hands of laymen, and I don't think that's true.
I'm not assuming that they are 50% effective either, I pulled the 50% number out of my ass, but so is your 0%, and I find it hard to imagine a physical reality where me keeping a 6 feet distance to an infected person decreases my infection probability significantly more than that person wearing a mask. Anecdotally, South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, where wearing masks is quite commonplace all seem to be doing better in transmission rate than the Western world, and all that without killing their economies. And considering that we're producing around 2 billion disposable plastic bottles a day, I'd currently bet money that we should be able to ramp up the supply of cheap masks for a sum that's a lot less than that of halting 50% of the Western economy for several months. Obviously, it can't happen in a day, but I'm not really seeing anyone try, except for perhaps Trump after his recent epiphany that Corona is not a Democrats' hoax. I'm willing to be dissuaded by someone who's actually thought it through, but sadly I haven't seen any such analyses.
I'm not an expert on infection control, but I work closely with people who either work in the infection control department of a hospital, or are running their own infection prevention and control consultancy. They live and breathe this, and I am only repeating almost verbatim what they have explained to me. I'm pretty sure they have "thought this through".
So believe what you want, but I'm gonna go with the experts on this, not someone who's only support is his own conjecture lol. They're not even the only ones saying this. Go Google some reputable sources yourself and stop guessing.
Your dismissive tone is uncalled for and not appreciated. Here's a systematic review that cites several studies that find face masks show a statistically significant effect in protection against influenza:
If your collaborators can point you to peer-reviewed studies that rebut these results, or to a serious current analysis that shows the impossibility (or estimates the price and time frame) of ramping up PPE production, please post it.
I'm not assuming that they are 50% effective either, I pulled the 50% number out of my ass, but so is your 0%, and I find it hard to imagine a physical reality where me keeping a 6 feet distance to an infected person decreases my infection probability significantly more than that person wearing a mask. Anecdotally, South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, where wearing masks is quite commonplace all seem to be doing better in transmission rate than the Western world, and all that without killing their economies. And considering that we're producing around 2 billion disposable plastic bottles a day, I'd currently bet money that we should be able to ramp up the supply of cheap masks for a sum that's a lot less than that of halting 50% of the Western economy for several months. Obviously, it can't happen in a day, but I'm not really seeing anyone try, except for perhaps Trump after his recent epiphany that Corona is not a Democrats' hoax. I'm willing to be dissuaded by someone who's actually thought it through, but sadly I haven't seen any such analyses.