Sources: Buzzfeed; @BillNye TikTok.com
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to surge throughout the country, Bill Nye “The Science Guy” has officially HAD IT with the “anti-masker” crowd: in videos on his TikTok site, he shuts them down perfectly by showing how masks help slow the spread of viruses.
During the summer, Nye posted a TikTok video demonstrating why masking works by being unable to blow out a candle while wearing one. And his current followup video has gone downright viral across the platform, racking up more than 17 million views and nearly five million likes.
“There’s a perception that the virus can travel through the fibers of a mask, like this red dot,” Nye explains, poking a red-tipped stick through a pasta strainer to demonstrate the bogus “science” that so many anti-maskers believe in. But:
“Viruses don’t travel by themselves — they travel in little droplets of spit and snot. When the droplets get…tangled…in the fibers of the mask, (the virus) gets trapped.” Nye then drops three red-dotted balls through a board with pegs representing mask fibers: they are stopped almost immediately.
Thank you, Bill, for continuing to educate young (and not-so-young) people about science. And please wear a mask when in crowded areas, especially when indoors.
And for those interested in the latest social media craze — eating icicles hanging from buildings — here’s advice from the TikTok site of Iowa meteorologist Katie Nickolaou:
“When icicles form from water that melts off your roof and runs down the side of a building — well, here’s the thing.
“You know what else is on your roof? Bird poop — a LOT of it, and that water picks it up and freezes it in the ice! YOU’RE EATING POOP!”