For healthcare workers or caregivers with prolonged exposure inside 1M of others it’s not symbolic. Most everyone else, it’s symbolic.
Then how does the virus spread in the population? How have dozens of people who gathered at bars, restaurants, church services, lakes, etc., caught it from each other?
Through touching and expectoration of the virus through breathing. People seem to think that the masks being ineffective is some kind of flat earth all-in argument. It's not.
Surgical and cotton masks are great for bacterial containment but ineffective for most viruses, which can be up to 400X smaller than bacteria. It's like trying to catch plankton in a salmon net.
From a peer-reviewed study in April:
Neither surgical nor cotton masks effectively filtered SARS–CoV-2 during coughs by infected patients. Prior evidence that surgical masks effectively filtered influenza virus
(1) informed recommendations that patients with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 should wear face masks to prevent transmission
(2). However, the size and concentrations of SARS–CoV-2 in aerosols generated during coughing are unknown. Oberg and Brousseau
(3) demonstrated that surgical masks did not exhibit adequate filter performance against aerosols measuring 0.9, 2.0, and 3.1 μm in diameter. Lee and colleagues
(4) showed that particles 0.04 to 0.2 μm can penetrate surgical masks. The size of the SARS–CoV particle from the 2002–2004 outbreak was estimated as 0.08 to 0.14 μm
(5); assuming that SARS-CoV-2 has a similar size, surgical masks are unlikely to effectively filter this virus.I realize this kind of science angers the mask orthodoxy, but that doesn't make it less true. This isn't even addressing all the people I see with the mask below their nose, using loose cloth bandannas, using the same cotton mask for weeks on end, etc.
As I've said often, wear a mask whenever you want if it makes you feel better.
Just be honest in acknowledging that for this virus, masks out in public are likely as effective as a pouch of chicken bones or a rabbit's foot.