“I think they did.”
Did what? Made the spread worse?
I’ve been fit tested for respirators to OSHA standards my whole career. Covid mask hygiene is absolutely horrible. There’s actually little doubt in my mind masks made covid spread worse. Everywhere you go in public everyone touches everything, then they touch their mask. Masks are on-off-on-off. Hand sanitation is what can make a difference. Here’s a study about how viruses spread through “bring your own bag”. Covid spread that same way with masks. https://www.neha.org/node/60021
Masks don’t cover your eyes. Anything covid particle that a mask might stop can get into your eyes and then you have covid in spite of wearing a mask.
Crappy masks areosolize particles so they can penetrate into your lungs better. There’s a scientific effort into areosolizing inhalers where lung penetration is desired.
Both my wife and I worked normally through the pandemic and never got covid. We wore masks where there was an official mandate, but only then.
And the dumbest thing ever is to wear a mask made in the same country the virus came from. I REFUSE to do that.
Except there’s zero evidence to support any spread through fomites with COVID-19.
And there’s zero evidence to support your theory about masks aerosolizing SARS-CoV-2 so it can penetrate into your lungs better.
And your anecdote about not getting infected thus far isn’t terribly useful without any context. Only 27% of the US has been infected so far, so your chances just blindly are 1 in 4. And that’s highly regional. Some states have seen as little as 5% of their population infected (Vermont, Hawaii, Alaska, etc.) Have you and your wife had regular serology tests done for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies? How do you know you haven’t had asymptomatic cases?
So none of this really adds up to anything substantive.