6 ms·

Did lockdowns work? The verdict on Covid restrictions

17 points by shaicoleman 3y ago

shaicoleman 3y ago
Direct PDF link: https://iea.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Perspectives-_1_Did-lockdowns-work__June_web.pdf https://iea.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Perspectives-_...
hunglee2 3y ago
Lockdowns would've 'worked' if everyone did it, hard and fast, at the same time. They obviously become less effective if the initial spread is not suppressed, then it becomes whack-a-mole. A lot of possible pandemics have been stopped this way, we just don't know about them because they were stopped. The concept is no different putting in fire breaks to stop a forest fire - isolate the infected, infection burns itself out, end of pandemic without need for global vaccination campaign. Lockdowns are a good idea at the beginning, bad idea in the middle, inconsequential idea at the end
- dadjoker 3y ago
  There was nothing inconsequential about their disastrous effects, especially on kids, with zero benefit. The "cure" was worse than the disease.
  - hunglee2 3y ago
    yes, inconsequential was the wrong word. Ineffective was better. Thanks
- dent9876543 3y ago
  They’re only a good idea if you have an exit strategy that is feasible. We didn’t have one. We didn’t even seem to have an infeasible strategy for a long time! And as a consequence, lockdown became performative rather than strategic. If we’d have locked down hard enough, and if infection had fully died away without meaningful transmission to animals, then we’d have been able to unlock. But we didn’t lock down hard, and probably we realistically could not have done so.
rootusrootus 3y ago
I'm curious how this differentiates between voluntary and involuntary lockdowns. Locally, we had compulsory lockdown for quite a while, but it was not even close to as effective as the early self-imposed social isolation that people did entirely of their own choice.
- 1letterunixname 3y ago
  In the US, specifically California, the so-called "mandatory" lockdowns were in effect without real legal threat. There were no police checkpoints and no meaningful enforcement. It was obvious that some people completely ignored the situation and did what they pleased regardless because they could claim they were "essential workers".
  - peteradio 3y ago
    I recall churches attempting to operate and getting sued.
    - rootusrootus 3y ago
      Organized gatherings are always going to attract more attention. Especially if they involve singing during a respiratory virus pandemic. There were some pretty good outbreaks related to group singing, as I recall.
ZeroGravitas 3y ago
https://iea.org.uk/noble-prizing-winning-economists/ https://iea.org.uk/noble-prizing-winning-economists/ > The IEA is an educational charity and free market think tank. > Our mission is to improve understanding of the fundamental institutions of a free society by analysing and expounding the role of the markets in solving economic and social problems. Given the current economic challenges facing Britain and the wider global environment, it is more vital than ever that we promote the intellectual case for a free economy, low taxes, freedom in education, health and welfare and lower levels of regulation. Which explains why they appear to be using weasel words and strained comparisons to downplay the benefits of regulation. > Mask mandates, which most countries avoided in Spring 2020, reduced mortality by 18.7 per cent, particularly mandates in workplaces; and 20% less deaths in exchange for mandating wearing a paper mask seems like a good deal? Esepecially as they're not comparing to not wearing masks, but just not requiring masks to be worn.
- dadjoker 3y ago
  Translation: make ad hominem attack instead of inspecting the data? > 20% less deaths in exchange for mandating wearing a paper mask seems like a good deal? Esepecially as they're not comparing to not wearing masks, but just not requiring masks to be worn That would be great if paper masks did anything to "control" an aerosolized virus. The RCT studies showing the worthlessness of masks in doing so are legion, and even the CDC and WHO wrote as much as far back as 2016.
chasd00 3y ago
“ COVID-19 lockdowns were “a global policy failure of gigantic proportions,” according to this peer-reviewed new academic study. The draconian policy failed to significantly reduce deaths while imposing substantial social, cultural, and economic costs.” Wow. I distinctly remember how toxic this place became when anyone even hinted at questioning the lockdowns. …or even just asking for more information. I hope many are spending some time reflecting on their horrible behavior and rash to judgement but I doubt it.
- chomp 3y ago
  I remember a lot of sealioning and a lot of users here becoming frustrated at bad faith arguments. Debates were frequently less than civil. Also note that you are quoting a relatively biased pro-business thinktank who is only looking at mortality and extrapolating success/failure. A complete perspective would need to look at reduction of local hospital system burden as well.
leobg 3y ago
I don’t get it. How can social distancing NOT help during a pandemic? Quote from the book 1491: “One reason is that Indians were fresh territory for many plagues, not just one. Smallpox, typhoid, bubonic plague, influenza, mumps, measles, whooping cough—all rained down on the Americas in the century after Columbus. (Cholera, malaria, and scarlet fever came later.) Having little experience with epidemic diseases, Indians had no knowledge of how to combat them. In contrast, Europeans were well versed in the brutal logic of quarantine. They boarded up houses in which plague appeared and fled to the countryside.” And here’s 3Blue1Brown running a simulation: https://youtu.be/gxAaO2rsdIs https://youtu.be/gxAaO2rsdIs
- kadoban 3y ago
  > I don’t get it. How can social distancing NOT help during a pandemic? It mostly seems to be for the same reason that several other things didn't work: half the population doesn't do it and ruins it for everyone else.
  - monsecchris 3y ago
    My own experience is more like 1 in 5000 people followed all the rules.
    - kadoban 3y ago
      Followed every rule perfectly? That sounds about right. That's really not that important though. But half of the US at least is actively hostile to doing anything to help anyone. Our society is broken and doomed.
    - ghaff 3y ago
      "All" is doing a lot of work there. My experience in Massachusetts, for example, is that there was quite a high rate of compliance with public masking rules in general. Yes, some people were sloppy about wearing them and many wore less effective masks. But I saw very little outright refusal in indoor public places.
  - ghaff 3y ago
jonp888 3y ago
Please be aware when reading this that the "Institute of Economic Affairs" is absolutely notorious in the UK for it's partisan and extreme libertarian views(at least in a British context), whether it be on tax cuts, climate change denial, promotion of gambling or the benefits of Brexit. It is extremely secretive about who it is funded by, to the point of deliberately losing court cases to avoid having to disclose anything. Even it's address, 55 Tufton Street is notorious as the home of multiple organisations which promote the same viewpoints, but it is by far the best known. A brief attempt by Prime Minister Liz Truss to embrace it's economic wisdom by implementing massive tax cuts primarily for the wealthy without any decrease in spending almost crashed the UK economy and ended her term in office after a few weeks. This doesn't mean everything they write is nonsense, but they most definitely will have started with a predefined conclusion and worked backwards to find a way to justify it.
- veave 3y ago
  HN is now a place where users warn about points of view being libertarian. The ideological shift has been tremendously real.
  - Auracle 3y ago
    I get your point but it’s always good to know where a bias might be.
  - jonp888 3y ago
    As I said, there's no need to completely disregard what they say, but readers outside the UK should be aware that some aspects of how the IEA operates are controversial, and though it presents itself as an institution carrying out empirical research, it is in reality a political lobbying group.
- 1letterunixname 3y ago
  Are British libertarian political views akin to an American ones: tiny government, lack of regulations, social liberalism, and fiscal conservatism? The American libertarianism brand is tainted by the Koch brothers and their CATO institute, a think-tank that put out false IPCC "addendums" in furtherance of denying climate change and promulgation of junk science to support industrial pollution and deregulation. https://whistleblower.org/politicization-of-climate-science/global-warming-denial-machine/cato-institute-counterfeit-u-s-climate-change-impacts-assessment/ https://whistleblower.org/politicization-of-climate-science/...
28304283409234 3y ago
Good. "In hindsight, we have 20/20 vision." The next pandemic will be different, with a different virus, acting differently. And dear god, I hope that we again chose the side of caution and go into lockdown. Even if it turns out to be a nett loss for the economy in the end.
- dent9876543 3y ago
  And a net loss for kids education, and a net loss for the vulnerable in who’s name the lockdown is enacted, and a net loss for the health of the nation who’s services were to be prevented from collapsing. It also would be good if next time we rely on those same set of “key workers”, who just so happen to be those that are relatively disadvantaged in political, health, and economic terms, despite that the next pandemic may actually have an IFR that matters more. But it’s good to stiff the economy. That will make up for all the other policy failures. And more people will be on board with that next time so there won’t be any of that pesky criticism of the settled science that there was this time. But good to stiff the economy. That’s what matters.

17 points by shaicoleman 3y ago

Direct PDF link: https://iea.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Perspectives-_1_Did-lockdowns-work__June_web.pdf https://iea.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Perspectives-_...

hunglee2 3y ago

Lockdowns would've 'worked' if everyone did it, hard and fast, at the same time. They obviously become less effective if the initial spread is not suppressed, then it becomes whack-a-mole. A lot of possible pandemics have been stopped this way, we just don't know about them because they were stopped. The concept is no different putting in fire breaks to stop a forest fire - isolate the infected, infection burns itself out, end of pandemic without need for global vaccination campaign. Lockdowns are a good idea at the beginning, bad idea in the middle, inconsequential idea at the end

dadjoker 3y ago
There was nothing inconsequential about their disastrous effects, especially on kids, with zero benefit. The "cure" was worse than the disease.
- hunglee2 3y ago
  yes, inconsequential was the wrong word. Ineffective was better. Thanks
dent9876543 3y ago
They’re only a good idea if you have an exit strategy that is feasible. We didn’t have one. We didn’t even seem to have an infeasible strategy for a long time! And as a consequence, lockdown became performative rather than strategic. If we’d have locked down hard enough, and if infection had fully died away without meaningful transmission to animals, then we’d have been able to unlock. But we didn’t lock down hard, and probably we realistically could not have done so.

rootusrootus 3y ago

I'm curious how this differentiates between voluntary and involuntary lockdowns. Locally, we had compulsory lockdown for quite a while, but it was not even close to as effective as the early self-imposed social isolation that people did entirely of their own choice.

1letterunixname 3y ago
In the US, specifically California, the so-called "mandatory" lockdowns were in effect without real legal threat. There were no police checkpoints and no meaningful enforcement. It was obvious that some people completely ignored the situation and did what they pleased regardless because they could claim they were "essential workers".
- peteradio 3y ago
  I recall churches attempting to operate and getting sued.
  - rootusrootus 3y ago
    Organized gatherings are always going to attract more attention. Especially if they involve singing during a respiratory virus pandemic. There were some pretty good outbreaks related to group singing, as I recall.

ZeroGravitas 3y ago

https://iea.org.uk/noble-prizing-winning-economists/ https://iea.org.uk/noble-prizing-winning-economists/ > The IEA is an educational charity and free market think tank. > Our mission is to improve understanding of the fundamental institutions of a free society by analysing and expounding the role of the markets in solving economic and social problems. Given the current economic challenges facing Britain and the wider global environment, it is more vital than ever that we promote the intellectual case for a free economy, low taxes, freedom in education, health and welfare and lower levels of regulation. Which explains why they appear to be using weasel words and strained comparisons to downplay the benefits of regulation. > Mask mandates, which most countries avoided in Spring 2020, reduced mortality by 18.7 per cent, particularly mandates in workplaces; and 20% less deaths in exchange for mandating wearing a paper mask seems like a good deal? Esepecially as they're not comparing to not wearing masks, but just not requiring masks to be worn.

dadjoker 3y ago
Translation: make ad hominem attack instead of inspecting the data? > 20% less deaths in exchange for mandating wearing a paper mask seems like a good deal? Esepecially as they're not comparing to not wearing masks, but just not requiring masks to be worn That would be great if paper masks did anything to "control" an aerosolized virus. The RCT studies showing the worthlessness of masks in doing so are legion, and even the CDC and WHO wrote as much as far back as 2016.

chasd00 3y ago

“ COVID-19 lockdowns were “a global policy failure of gigantic proportions,” according to this peer-reviewed new academic study. The draconian policy failed to significantly reduce deaths while imposing substantial social, cultural, and economic costs.” Wow. I distinctly remember how toxic this place became when anyone even hinted at questioning the lockdowns. …or even just asking for more information. I hope many are spending some time reflecting on their horrible behavior and rash to judgement but I doubt it.

chomp 3y ago
I remember a lot of sealioning and a lot of users here becoming frustrated at bad faith arguments. Debates were frequently less than civil. Also note that you are quoting a relatively biased pro-business thinktank who is only looking at mortality and extrapolating success/failure. A complete perspective would need to look at reduction of local hospital system burden as well.

leobg 3y ago

I don’t get it. How can social distancing NOT help during a pandemic? Quote from the book 1491: “One reason is that Indians were fresh territory for many plagues, not just one. Smallpox, typhoid, bubonic plague, influenza, mumps, measles, whooping cough—all rained down on the Americas in the century after Columbus. (Cholera, malaria, and scarlet fever came later.) Having little experience with epidemic diseases, Indians had no knowledge of how to combat them. In contrast, Europeans were well versed in the brutal logic of quarantine. They boarded up houses in which plague appeared and fled to the countryside.” And here’s 3Blue1Brown running a simulation: https://youtu.be/gxAaO2rsdIs https://youtu.be/gxAaO2rsdIs

kadoban 3y ago
> I don’t get it. How can social distancing NOT help during a pandemic? It mostly seems to be for the same reason that several other things didn't work: half the population doesn't do it and ruins it for everyone else.
- monsecchris 3y ago
  My own experience is more like 1 in 5000 people followed all the rules.
  - kadoban 3y ago
    Followed every rule perfectly? That sounds about right. That's really not that important though. But half of the US at least is actively hostile to doing anything to help anyone. Our society is broken and doomed.
  - ghaff 3y ago
    "All" is doing a lot of work there. My experience in Massachusetts, for example, is that there was quite a high rate of compliance with public masking rules in general. Yes, some people were sloppy about wearing them and many wore less effective masks. But I saw very little outright refusal in indoor public places.
- ghaff 3y ago

jonp888 3y ago

Please be aware when reading this that the "Institute of Economic Affairs" is absolutely notorious in the UK for it's partisan and extreme libertarian views(at least in a British context), whether it be on tax cuts, climate change denial, promotion of gambling or the benefits of Brexit. It is extremely secretive about who it is funded by, to the point of deliberately losing court cases to avoid having to disclose anything. Even it's address, 55 Tufton Street is notorious as the home of multiple organisations which promote the same viewpoints, but it is by far the best known. A brief attempt by Prime Minister Liz Truss to embrace it's economic wisdom by implementing massive tax cuts primarily for the wealthy without any decrease in spending almost crashed the UK economy and ended her term in office after a few weeks. This doesn't mean everything they write is nonsense, but they most definitely will have started with a predefined conclusion and worked backwards to find a way to justify it.

veave 3y ago
HN is now a place where users warn about points of view being libertarian. The ideological shift has been tremendously real.
- Auracle 3y ago
  I get your point but it’s always good to know where a bias might be.
- jonp888 3y ago
  As I said, there's no need to completely disregard what they say, but readers outside the UK should be aware that some aspects of how the IEA operates are controversial, and though it presents itself as an institution carrying out empirical research, it is in reality a political lobbying group.
1letterunixname 3y ago
Are British libertarian political views akin to an American ones: tiny government, lack of regulations, social liberalism, and fiscal conservatism? The American libertarianism brand is tainted by the Koch brothers and their CATO institute, a think-tank that put out false IPCC "addendums" in furtherance of denying climate change and promulgation of junk science to support industrial pollution and deregulation. https://whistleblower.org/politicization-of-climate-science/global-warming-denial-machine/cato-institute-counterfeit-u-s-climate-change-impacts-assessment/ https://whistleblower.org/politicization-of-climate-science/...

28304283409234 3y ago

Good. "In hindsight, we have 20/20 vision." The next pandemic will be different, with a different virus, acting differently. And dear god, I hope that we again chose the side of caution and go into lockdown. Even if it turns out to be a nett loss for the economy in the end.

dent9876543 3y ago
And a net loss for kids education, and a net loss for the vulnerable in who’s name the lockdown is enacted, and a net loss for the health of the nation who’s services were to be prevented from collapsing. It also would be good if next time we rely on those same set of “key workers”, who just so happen to be those that are relatively disadvantaged in political, health, and economic terms, despite that the next pandemic may actually have an IFR that matters more. But it’s good to stiff the economy. That will make up for all the other policy failures. And more people will be on board with that next time so there won’t be any of that pesky criticism of the settled science that there was this time. But good to stiff the economy. That’s what matters.