Actually, what was learned is that masking was one of the most effective means for fighting the spread. The research from the 50s that drove mask design was in fact wrong, the molecules were smaller than thought by a significant amount.
I hated wearing a mask, and I hate seeing people in public wearing them. I tolerated it based on the advice from the same doctor who have kept me going with kidney failure for the last 15 years. Likewise the vaccine. Yeah, the survival rate was pretty high, but there are people like me who have a serious risk of death, or maybe even worse, long Covid.
The reality is that just like any other crisis situation, the learning curve is ugly and what seems to be a decent answer is learned not to be one until we get closer to something that works. The legal analysis related to public health authority goes back to 1905, is not seriously questioned, and was in issue in the Spanish flu outbreak over 100 years ago. The same snivels were made then, and we just as incorrect.
For my money, the people who claim their mental health depended on contact with other people had a far more serious deep pathology.
(there's a first time for everything). Kid comes hauling up behind me in a VW Jetta and starts blowing the horn and flashing his lights. So what am I supposed to do, make like smoke and disappear? It's unsafe to move right because I would be braking into an inadequate gap, no doubt incurring the justified wrath of those in that lane. So Mr Speed crosses the double white line into the HOV lane and blows by, waving his arms and blowing the horn some some at a good limit +20. Really? I had two more cars to pass which would have left me clear to move right in about 20 seconds. I wonder what Mr Speed did with those 20 seconds that day.
