OP, you know you were VERY free to use any of the other options, yes? The thing is that billions of people had to be provided with some kind of protection. It’s too expensive to give the most ideal mask to everybody, you find a compromise between adequate protection and cost - and you also implement other protective measures, such as social distancing and lockdowns, to compensate. Which, I don’t know if you’re old enough to remember, is what happened.