"Masks don't work"
"Vaccines don't work"
"Distancing doesn't work"

(They do. Just imperfectly).

I've heard so many of these types of comments over the past 3 years, I thought it was time to write a bit about how one big aspect of infection is a numbers game. /1

@aetiology People talk about the "Swiss cheese" model of prevention but I like to think instead of a rigged carnival game. In principle, the ring can go on the bottle. But the motion and alignment have to be perfect, and at a certain distance, is very unlikely. Each layer of protective behavior makes the distance further, the ring smaller, until the probability becomes virtually zero.