I am not a pilot or an engineer, but when I read the article I remembered how many times I heard a flight attendant explain that in case of "sudden loss of cabin pressure" the oxygen masks would fall in front of us. Fine, but what about a slow loss of cabin pressure?
All commercial airline planes have a system that will deploy the oxygen masks as the cabin altitude passes through 14,000 feet. When cruising at altitude, the plane may be at 35,000 feet but the cabin is at 6,500 feet or so, depending on the pressure differential design of that model.
This fact would rule out the speculation in this article.
I had three altitude chamber rides as a USAF pilot. On each, the participants experience hypoxia and its effects as well as a rapid decompression where you are at sea level and in a second are at 23,000 feet. The air just blows out of your lungs causing a fog in front of your face. Donning the oxygen mask solves the problem because it has a positive pressure setting that pumps 100% Oxygen to your lungs. Hypoxia is a sneaky problem in that as your body becomes oxygen starved, a feeling of euphoria is experienced where there is a “no cause for alarm” sense to take corrective action.