Why We Need To End Lockdowns (at least in most places)

[Ackbach]

See this excellent article for a summary, with links, as to why the lockdowns are showing up as ineffective. HT: Yih-Chau Chang on LinkedIn. Also, I have written a blog post containing the very beginnings of a causal analysis of lockdowns on COVID deaths here.

With regard to my blog post, I also want to comment that I have done a search on Google Scholar, and found a very few articles, supposedly on the causal effect of lockdowns on COVID, and have found them to be severely lacking in sound statistics and especially in causal inference (as in, Judea Pearl, Shpitser, etc., whom I would commend to your attention). They are lacking enough in sound methodology as to render their conclusions unwarranted.

What I really want to do is dive into the modeling with causal diagrams and Structural Causal Models, but I'm not sure if I know enough to do that. I'm not an epidemiologist. Unfortunately, I don't even see the epidemiologists doing this research.

 

[tango]

Very true on the way so much has turned to emotional appeal. The "money over lives" mantra is a convenient thing for those on the political left to rabbit ad nauseum but it's not as if staying home provides any guarantee of safety - far from it for many people.

Then there are the lines like "would you really risk your life and the lives of others to get a haircut?", clearly intended to highlight just how selfish anyone who answered in the affirmative really is. But of course most people drive to get a haircut, risking their life and the lives of others along the way, coronavirus or no coronavirus. It's just that we don't think of the risks of getting in the car, probably because the media somehow manages to go more than a couple of hours at a time without reminding us that someone else died on the roads, even though the reality is that nationwide nearly 100 people every day die on the roads, not to mention many more injured.

Which leads neatly into the other emotional manipulation. "If it saves one life it will be worth it". On that basis we should shut down motor transportation completely and obviously prohibit the use of sharp objects for any reason. Hey, if it saves one life it's worth it, right? On the other hand we could just reopen everything right away - that will undoubtedly save the life of at least one spouse facing being battered and killed by an abusive spouse. If reopening saves even that one life it's worth it, right?

 

[Ackbach]

Right, totally agree. The hypocrisy and inconsistency are breathtaking; however, the far left doesn't care. See my post on the MeToo thread.

 

[Albion]

The sad fact appears to be that there is no good way forward. Not one that is without risk.

We cannot do away with all restraint. We also cannot impoverish the whole country. We cannot police everybody who disregards the safe distance/wear a mask policies if the lockdowns are reversed. And we ought not get comfortable with the unconstitutional actions taken by too many "tiny tyrants." We are in a bad position.

 

[tango]

The sad fact appears to be that there is no good way forward. Not one that is without risk.

We cannot do away with all restraint. We also cannot impoverish the whole country. We cannot police everybody who disregards the safe distance/wear a mask policies if the lockdowns are reversed. And we ought not get comfortable with the unconstitutional actions taken by too many "tiny tyrants." We are in a bad position.

The brutal reality is that life is not without risk, virus or no virus. The death rate has been pretty consistent since the first humans walked the earth - with virtually zero exceptions it's held steady at one per person.

North of 30,000 people die every year on the roads but we don't hear any calls to shut down motor transport. People die of preventable diseases all the time but only the silliest fringe of the political left want to see bans on fatty foods and sugary drinks. In the early stages of the virus paranoia the fear was that the virus damaged the heart and lungs of people who survived it - apparently that was enough to start shutting everything down even though people voluntarily smoke and voluntarily eat their own body weight in lard despite the damage to heart and lungs associated with those being very well known by now,.

The crucial question has to be just what overall priorities should be, given people can always choose a stricter set of rules for themselves. Allowing restaurants to reopen doesn't mandate anyone to actually go to a restaurant to eat - if right now every single restriction were lifted anybody who believed it was too dangerous to go out would still be welcome to stay home, just as immune-compromised people have done since there were immune-compromised people.

The only way to police the growing list of regulations is with an army of snitches. That should work out really well - it will either prove an adage that "snitches get stitches" and increase the load on the medical system at a time it allegedly really doesn't need it, or it will create a society that would make the Stasi proud.