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While this may be true, I think it's important to remember that the negative effects of not doing the lockdowns would have been much worse. A million people di

While this may be true, I think it's important to remember that the negative effects of not doing the lockdowns would have been much worse. A million people died (and more are still dying! the pandemic is not over!) in the US alone, even with the partially-effective measures we took. Imagine if we hadn't even tried to reduce transmission. Hospitals would have been rapidly overwhelmed (many already got overwhelmed at the peaks, others came very close), and even people who could have been treated—both for COVID and for other health issues—would have died because they couldn't get access. What are the negative economic impacts of having, say, 3% of your population (10 million people) die over a two-year span? What are the negative economic impacts of the terrible psychological toll of all that loss? And of the government and other institutions just...not caring?

gjsman-1000 4y ago
The problem with that “it would’ve been worse” is that the timeline didn’t happen that way, so it is merely conjecture by people who have every incentive to save face for their decisions. The other problem is that it isn’t true. Florida has had 10,000 deaths less than California, despite no lockdown and more old people.
- munch117 4y ago
  > The problem with that “it would’ve been worse” is that the timeline didn’t happen that way Ah, but we did see it. In Italy in the first week of March 2020, we saw what an unchecked epidemic looked like. The health care system was overwhelmed and in chaos. Funeral services couldn't keep up because people were dying in large numbers. > Florida ... no lockdown Here's a story about the Florida lockdown being lifted: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/florida-lifts-covid-19-restrictions/story?id=73294496 https://abcnews.go.com/Health/florida-lifts-covid-19-restric... The differences in approach between US states aren't as big as you remember them.
kcplate 4y ago
> While this may be true, I think it's important to remember that the negative effects of not doing the lockdowns would have been much worse would is definitive. You don’t know that, and there seems to be plenty of real world examples of hard Covid mitigation policies to soft Covid mitigation policies that indicates it’s not that simple. Could it have been worse? Sure, but frankly it could have been better too with less lockdown.

gjsman-1000 4y ago

The problem with that “it would’ve been worse” is that the timeline didn’t happen that way, so it is merely conjecture by people who have every incentive to save face for their decisions. The other problem is that it isn’t true. Florida has had 10,000 deaths less than California, despite no lockdown and more old people.

munch117 4y ago
> The problem with that “it would’ve been worse” is that the timeline didn’t happen that way Ah, but we did see it. In Italy in the first week of March 2020, we saw what an unchecked epidemic looked like. The health care system was overwhelmed and in chaos. Funeral services couldn't keep up because people were dying in large numbers. > Florida ... no lockdown Here's a story about the Florida lockdown being lifted: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/florida-lifts-covid-19-restrictions/story?id=73294496 https://abcnews.go.com/Health/florida-lifts-covid-19-restric... The differences in approach between US states aren't as big as you remember them.

kcplate 4y ago

> While this may be true, I think it's important to remember that the negative effects of not doing the lockdowns would have been much worse would is definitive. You don’t know that, and there seems to be plenty of real world examples of hard Covid mitigation policies to soft Covid mitigation policies that indicates it’s not that simple. Could it have been worse? Sure, but frankly it could have been better too with less lockdown.