Your succinct summary is great and it also identifies how difficult and mixed-up the messaging around these measures were – the measures were taken, but oftenti

Your succinct summary is great and it also identifies how difficult and mixed-up the messaging around these measures were – the measures were taken, but oftentimes less than optimally, but that gave all the fuel to claim they were ineffective, and the nuance of how effective they were or were not as well as if they had been implemented with more effect (e.g., as in NZ, which, of course, is different from the US in many ways), is all lost in social media act-react exchanges. I think nuance, subtly, and details of conversation, while never having been that prominent to begin with, have been major victims of this post-truth society we've entered. Healthy exchanges with mutual respect, even if we disagree with one-another, seems almost lost as we've gotten conditioned to take everything as a with-us or against-us type position. It even discourages me from bringing certain topics for discussion altogether because I fear the one-sided retorts we've been conditioned to make. It's really quite tragic.