June 25, 2023 - 3:10pm
One of the main criticisms about public inquiries is that they produce a need for blame and scapegoats, rather than a thorough understanding of the facts about complex problems.
The second week of the UK Covid inquiry focused heavily on the lack of pandemic preparedness, the consequences of austerity policies and the perils of groupthink in the UK civil service bureaucracy.
The former Chief Medical Officer, Sally Davies, and former Prime Minister, David Cameron, both claimed that a pandemic influenza “groupthink” had taken over emergency planning and blinded experts to the unique threat of Covid. The country had prepared for the wrong pandemic.
George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer under the Cameron government, stated that: “no one…anywhere in the Western World or anywhere in the world said…governments should prepare for a coronavirus pandemic that will require us to lockdown the entire economy for months on end.”
But these ideas risk perpetuating a false narrative about Covid exceptionalism that must be questioned.
First, the idea that pandemic influenza plans were not sufficiently fit-for-purpose for Covid is wrong. Of course, every pathogen has unique attributes but, in general, the WHO guidelines for non-pharmaceutical interventions produced in late 2019 provided a solid base to respond. Likewise, the updated Cochrane review on community masking (which showed little effect) pooled studies from influenza and Covid for good methodological reasons. Government estimates from 2017 show upwards of 750,000 excess deaths could occur during an influenza pandemic in the UK. Current official data suggest 227,000 deaths from Covid since 2020.
Second, the idea that lockdowns were not considered because of ‘influenza groupthink’ sidesteps the political origins of the policy. On Tuesday, Osborne repeated the obvious point that has now become a more acceptable opinion: “I think the Chinese lockdown [gave] the rest of the world the idea of a lockdown.” The scientific advice prior to the infamous Ferguson model was to reject or delay lockdown. In fact, Neil Ferguson himself acknowledged this: “If China had not done it…the year would have been very different.”
On Thursday, the current Chief Medical Officer, Chris Whitty, told the inquiry that the government needed more “radicalism” in its health emergency response; the ‘leap of imagination’ of lockdown would not have occurred if only they had prepared for it.
Recently, a series of articles, mostly in Left-leaning outlets, have bemoaned efforts to question this narrative as a form of lockdown revisionism, but these claims are decidedly obtuse and incorrect.
Lockdowns were outside the bounds of possibility because they were considered to be antithetical to certain Western political and social values in times of calm thinking. This is embodied in the term itself: since the 1970s, a “lockdown” has meant the forced confinement of prison inmates and psychiatric patients, and more recently in the United States, active shooter situations (e.g. in schools). That Britain copied the Chinese Communist Party’s new lockdown “radicalism” is uncomfortable to say out loud.
Third, the absence of lockdown recommendations in pandemic influenza plans also accounted for their harms. The goal was to disrupt the normal functioning of society
to the least possible degree. And yet, just a few months ago, Rishi Sunak, the current Prime Minister, stated that: “I wasn’t allowed to talk about trade-offs…the script was not to ever acknowledge them. The script was: oh, there’s no trade-off.”
Sally Davies implicitly acknowledged these trade-offs on Tuesdays when she said that lockdown had “damaged a generation”. And yet, she then went on to say that “I still think we should have locked down, although a week earlier.” This seems to now be the consensus position.
Fourth, it is imperative that the inquiry takes a more sceptical approach to the effectiveness of lockdown on disease epidemiology. Both Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallence, the former Chief Scientific Advisor, who spoke this week to the inquiry were also witnesses to a major 2021 parliamentary Covid report that was roughly in line with the positions they took this week: faster lockdown.
A consensus about lockdown “radicalism” (to use Whitty’s term) was created in the stress of the moment. But it quickly ascended to the status of a regime of truth. Yes, many consensus positions, including a December 2022 technical report written by Whitty and Vallence, continue to state that “lockdowns work” but other work seriously calls this into question.
The pandemic influenza blame game may be a convenient narrative, but it does not easily fit the facts.
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SubscribeI can’t believe the British public accepted the most egregious infringement of our civil liberties ever.
I don’t care on who’s advice.
It was wrong wrong wrong… nothing more to say.
But we did accept it, and generally with considerable patience and community spirit. Whether right or wrong scientifically the Public sensed the need for it to reduce transmission rate. Whether it had to be mandated or would have worked voluntarily will hopefully be something they further discuss and assess.
I think this is true. The public generally supported lockdowns and all sort of illiberal actions. And in the early days, a lot of this may have been organic. Think of the images from Italy. As time went on, the fear was driven by govt.
Cummings was particularly distressed by what he saw in Bergamo.
The rest of us should have ignored it as a typical Italian panic attack.
Cummings was particularly distressed by what he saw in Bergamo.
The rest of us should have ignored it as a typical Italian panic attack.
I think this is true. The public generally supported lockdowns and all sort of illiberal actions. And in the early days, a lot of this may have been organic. Think of the images from Italy. As time went on, the fear was driven by govt.
But we did accept it, and generally with considerable patience and community spirit. Whether right or wrong scientifically the Public sensed the need for it to reduce transmission rate. Whether it had to be mandated or would have worked voluntarily will hopefully be something they further discuss and assess.
I can’t believe the British public accepted the most egregious infringement of our civil liberties ever.
I don’t care on who’s advice.
It was wrong wrong wrong… nothing more to say.
Chris Whitty said that scientists did not and would not recommend a lockdown. The instruction had to come from a Minister, then scientists would not oppose it.
I am reminded of Fraser Nelson’s on line interview of Professor Medley (is my spelling right?) the social modeler who admitted to Fraser that government had requested only models that required action (ie bad case examples).
Who had made these requests of the professor? Ministers? Permanent bureaucrats? Fraser Nelson did not ask. Or if he did he got no reply. Or if he got an answer he kept it to himself.
Which minister(s) recommended lockdown and fingered scientists for the decision? And invented THE SCIENCE? If Chris Whitty knows he should say.
We must now demand NAMES. And demand of the names why they chose the decisions they did. And who advised them of THE SCIENCE since it was not the scientists.
That’s not what he said at all, and you’re just creating more sceptic dogma. These were his words:
“It would be very surprising, without this being requested by a senior politician or similar, that a scientific committee would venture in between emergencies into that kind of extraordinarily major social intervention with huge economic and social impact ramifications.”
He therefore recognises the scale of such an intervention but didn’t come close to saying he would not recommend it.
My words are a blunter version of his. You are a word twister. And likely far more of a dogmatist than those who take issue with you.
A blunter version = a different version.
A blunter version = a different version.
“sceptic dogma”
Oxymoronic doublethink.
My words are a blunter version of his. You are a word twister. And likely far more of a dogmatist than those who take issue with you.
“sceptic dogma”
Oxymoronic doublethink.
That’s not what he said at all, and you’re just creating more sceptic dogma. These were his words:
“It would be very surprising, without this being requested by a senior politician or similar, that a scientific committee would venture in between emergencies into that kind of extraordinarily major social intervention with huge economic and social impact ramifications.”
He therefore recognises the scale of such an intervention but didn’t come close to saying he would not recommend it.
Chris Whitty said that scientists did not and would not recommend a lockdown. The instruction had to come from a Minister, then scientists would not oppose it.
I am reminded of Fraser Nelson’s on line interview of Professor Medley (is my spelling right?) the social modeler who admitted to Fraser that government had requested only models that required action (ie bad case examples).
Who had made these requests of the professor? Ministers? Permanent bureaucrats? Fraser Nelson did not ask. Or if he did he got no reply. Or if he got an answer he kept it to himself.
Which minister(s) recommended lockdown and fingered scientists for the decision? And invented THE SCIENCE? If Chris Whitty knows he should say.
We must now demand NAMES. And demand of the names why they chose the decisions they did. And who advised them of THE SCIENCE since it was not the scientists.
Ignore the sadly deluded zealots and the self-deceiving, captured medical and political “elites” (aka scared little boys and girls) desperately clutching on to one another as they cower in the smouldering wreckage of their imploded narratives, and as they seek to expatiate the guilt that even the most stone-heartened and psychopathic of them (and there is some stiff competition for that particular title) must now be feeling for their murderous “lockdowns”. As if such a preposterous policy for dealing with any viral outbreak could possibly do more good than harm. The serpent tricked them, and deep down they know it.
Ask instead, who benefited? For example who benefited from the accelerated adoption of digital tech? Who benefited from the personal-agency sapping, morale-destroying fear, anxiety, loneliness and desperation for a magical “way out” that they induced? Here’s a clue: it wasn’t vulnerable children, the sick, the elderly, or your average decent working man or woman on the street.
I personally benefited enormously from the investment opportunity of a lifetime!*
(* From the provision of PPE stuff.)
I personally benefited enormously from the investment opportunity of a lifetime!*
(* From the provision of PPE stuff.)
Ignore the sadly deluded zealots and the self-deceiving, captured medical and political “elites” (aka scared little boys and girls) desperately clutching on to one another as they cower in the smouldering wreckage of their imploded narratives, and as they seek to expatiate the guilt that even the most stone-heartened and psychopathic of them (and there is some stiff competition for that particular title) must now be feeling for their murderous “lockdowns”. As if such a preposterous policy for dealing with any viral outbreak could possibly do more good than harm. The serpent tricked them, and deep down they know it.
Ask instead, who benefited? For example who benefited from the accelerated adoption of digital tech? Who benefited from the personal-agency sapping, morale-destroying fear, anxiety, loneliness and desperation for a magical “way out” that they induced? Here’s a clue: it wasn’t vulnerable children, the sick, the elderly, or your average decent working man or woman on the street.
This was a national disaster of epic proportions, because regrettably the vast majority of the British population were/are brain dead morons, thanks to seventy plus years of State education.
Bravo!.
Actually CS state education 150 yrs old. Shocked and surprised you mustn’t had good history teaching at your school. Even the Comp I went to taught me that.
You may be mixing up the age to which one went as that been extended over the 150yrs.
As regards the contention we are a nation of idiots – well I don’t concur but perhaps there was some evidence in recent elections or public votes do you think?
Agreed I should have been more precise.
1870- 1945, was adequate.
However since 1945 and the infiltration of pernicious marxist ideological dogma throughout the system from Balliol upwards, it has been a disaster would you not agree?
Certainly been some errors in Education policy, but can’t concur that having overwhelming majority of populous only educated up to age 11, or 14 going to help a Country in the modern world.
I mean we’ve also had Eton and Winchester make a right hash of things haven’t we.
The ‘dissolution’ of the Grammar Schools was a fatal error, and will probably never be repaired.
Partial dissolution and only from 74 wasn’t it?
Something in this, but the issue was as much how we never properly set up the technical moderns and they were always the poor relative. Doing the tripartite system properly would have much better balanced the resources to each. Instead the Grammars did much better and that wasn’t fair or economically sensible for a Nation IMO
Tony Crosland in ‘65 started the destruction of the Tripartite system with a vengeance.
What percentage of Grammar Schools remain? 5% perhaps?
The real problem was that that ‘we’ just couldn’t afford to fund the Secondary Mods properly. Too busy squandering largesse on ‘benefits’ and pretending to be a World/Great Power. All rather pathetic in
retrospect.
Tony Crosland in ‘65 started the destruction of the Tripartite system with a vengeance.
What percentage of Grammar Schools remain? 5% perhaps?
The real problem was that that ‘we’ just couldn’t afford to fund the Secondary Mods properly. Too busy squandering largesse on ‘benefits’ and pretending to be a World/Great Power. All rather pathetic in
retrospect.
Partial dissolution and only from 74 wasn’t it?
Something in this, but the issue was as much how we never properly set up the technical moderns and they were always the poor relative. Doing the tripartite system properly would have much better balanced the resources to each. Instead the Grammars did much better and that wasn’t fair or economically sensible for a Nation IMO
The ‘dissolution’ of the Grammar Schools was a fatal error, and will probably never be repaired.
Certainly been some errors in Education policy, but can’t concur that having overwhelming majority of populous only educated up to age 11, or 14 going to help a Country in the modern world.
I mean we’ve also had Eton and Winchester make a right hash of things haven’t we.
Just because people do not vote the way you want does not make them idiots. Maybe it is you who is the idiot
Agreed I should have been more precise.
1870- 1945, was adequate.
However since 1945 and the infiltration of pernicious marxist ideological dogma throughout the system from Balliol upwards, it has been a disaster would you not agree?
Just because people do not vote the way you want does not make them idiots. Maybe it is you who is the idiot
Puzzling choice of number there – did state education start in 1950? Or start going wrong then? I would imagine the actual percentage of brain-dead morons in British society (at both ends of the social scale) has in fact remained roughly stable over the millennia.
As above, the “rot” really started in 1945.
Perhaps, but for centuries they didn’t have the vote and had not been ‘weaponised’.
Now they have and hence the dilemma.
As above, the “rot” really started in 1945.
Perhaps, but for centuries they didn’t have the vote and had not been ‘weaponised’.
Now they have and hence the dilemma.
State education came about as a consequence of the militarisation of society in the run up to WW1.
But you’re right: it hasn’t been a success.
I think initially 1872 Edu Act related to the extended franchise and the ruling classes clicking better educate folks with some basics if they can now vote. A simplification as there were many additional motives, but much in it I think. A theme that continues perhaps.
It’s generally a myth that working people weren’t educated prior to the state takeover. Compare the work done by 11 year olds in the charity schools of the 1890s with that of 11 year olds now. You might get a shock.
Or look at the letters of WW1 soldiers and compare them with the current output
Or look at the letters of WW1 soldiers and compare them with the current output
It’s generally a myth that working people weren’t educated prior to the state takeover. Compare the work done by 11 year olds in the charity schools of the 1890s with that of 11 year olds now. You might get a shock.
I think initially 1872 Edu Act related to the extended franchise and the ruling classes clicking better educate folks with some basics if they can now vote. A simplification as there were many additional motives, but much in it I think. A theme that continues perhaps.
If the vast majority of the British population are brain dead morons, what is there to be patriotic about?
The ones who aren’t.
The ones who aren’t.
Actually CS state education 150 yrs old. Shocked and surprised you mustn’t had good history teaching at your school. Even the Comp I went to taught me that.
You may be mixing up the age to which one went as that been extended over the 150yrs.
As regards the contention we are a nation of idiots – well I don’t concur but perhaps there was some evidence in recent elections or public votes do you think?
Puzzling choice of number there – did state education start in 1950? Or start going wrong then? I would imagine the actual percentage of brain-dead morons in British society (at both ends of the social scale) has in fact remained roughly stable over the millennia.
State education came about as a consequence of the militarisation of society in the run up to WW1.
But you’re right: it hasn’t been a success.
If the vast majority of the British population are brain dead morons, what is there to be patriotic about?
This was a national disaster of epic proportions, because regrettably the vast majority of the British population were/are brain dead morons, thanks to seventy plus years of State education.
Bravo!.
I see about two thirds of the comments have been removed. Frustrating. Unherd need to have a link somewhere outlining why this happens. What makes this any different than google or Facebook or Twitter?
Always happens when there is disagreement and downvotes. Could be people abusing the moderation system if there are posts they don’t like of course.
Always happens when there is disagreement and downvotes. Could be people abusing the moderation system if there are posts they don’t like of course.
I see about two thirds of the comments have been removed. Frustrating. Unherd need to have a link somewhere outlining why this happens. What makes this any different than google or Facebook or Twitter?
What do we need to know that we don’t already know thanks to the lockdown WhatsApp messages and partygate shenanigans?
What else does one need?
What do we need to know that we don’t already know thanks to the lockdown WhatsApp messages and partygate shenanigans?
What else does one need?
Ministers, the media, social media, then the public supported lockdown. Yes. But where did the very idea of lockdown come from (even before it was done in Italy)?
From China. Where the virus came from.
No lessons can be learned by this enquiry without focusing on the years long collaboration between the US (and its follower the UK) and the CCP.
Not just in the economic sphere but in the matter of bio-weapons research. Organised openly by Peter Daszak’s Eco Health operation. Financed in part by the NISAID under Dr. Fauci.
Over the years of cooperation it’s a guess as to whether the US has undermined the CCP (as it hoped) or the CCP hollowed out the US.
in the matter of covid and the West’s ruinous response to it the CCP seems the winner.
Will the enquiry try to take evidence from any actors in this murky zone? I don’t think so.
Might it ask for input from other jurisdictions that avoided lockdown? Sweden? Or even Florida and Governor De Santis? Again I expect not.
Ministers, the media, social media, then the public supported lockdown. Yes. But where did the very idea of lockdown come from (even before it was done in Italy)?
From China. Where the virus came from.
No lessons can be learned by this enquiry without focusing on the years long collaboration between the US (and its follower the UK) and the CCP.
Not just in the economic sphere but in the matter of bio-weapons research. Organised openly by Peter Daszak’s Eco Health operation. Financed in part by the NISAID under Dr. Fauci.
Over the years of cooperation it’s a guess as to whether the US has undermined the CCP (as it hoped) or the CCP hollowed out the US.
in the matter of covid and the West’s ruinous response to it the CCP seems the winner.
Will the enquiry try to take evidence from any actors in this murky zone? I don’t think so.
Might it ask for input from other jurisdictions that avoided lockdown? Sweden? Or even Florida and Governor De Santis? Again I expect not.
The Inquiry must focus on the need, or otherwise, for mandated Lockdowns so we can learn. There is a danger though we are focusing on the Policy response rather than the scientific argument about needing to stem rate of transmission because hospitals were being overrun and that was affecting all other care, planned and emergency, too.
We’ve heard a bit about the difference in starting capacity our health service had when compared to similar Countries and certainly having the lowest per capita rate of Intensive care beds meant overload happened much quicker. That of course wasn’t the only emergency response overrun in the early weeks and at incredible speed in some areas where the virus exploded.
The Lockdown question needs to cover what would have happened to transmission rate and basic emergency care for everything else had we done nothing, or relied on a voluntary approach to social distancing. Serious consideration on this and not a collective Groupthink it shouldn’t be asked. My instinct we probably had to do something like a Lockdown, albeit the rules could have been different, but I want to hear the full debate and argument and not have it truncated.
You’re right about that – we need an impartial assessment of the value of lockdowns. My suspicion is we won’t get it, just another Chilcot. The establishment looks after its own.
You’re right about that – we need an impartial assessment of the value of lockdowns. My suspicion is we won’t get it, just another Chilcot. The establishment looks after its own.
The Inquiry must focus on the need, or otherwise, for mandated Lockdowns so we can learn. There is a danger though we are focusing on the Policy response rather than the scientific argument about needing to stem rate of transmission because hospitals were being overrun and that was affecting all other care, planned and emergency, too.
We’ve heard a bit about the difference in starting capacity our health service had when compared to similar Countries and certainly having the lowest per capita rate of Intensive care beds meant overload happened much quicker. That of course wasn’t the only emergency response overrun in the early weeks and at incredible speed in some areas where the virus exploded.
The Lockdown question needs to cover what would have happened to transmission rate and basic emergency care for everything else had we done nothing, or relied on a voluntary approach to social distancing. Serious consideration on this and not a collective Groupthink it shouldn’t be asked. My instinct we probably had to do something like a Lockdown, albeit the rules could have been different, but I want to hear the full debate and argument and not have it truncated.
Pandemic preparedness has been a fine business for certain segments culminating the the effort called Event 201 which proposed a pathogen considerably more lethal than Covid. So things like the Trusted News Initiative had been built to ensure “necessary” policies had no opposition. Considerable effort in using nudge tools and other ways to influence thought, promote fear and control the public perception were created and used. Sadly, once the actual death rate proved much less than the planning rate, the system was in full gear. Perhaps those at the top understood but the middle managers charged ahead, even now thinking they were being responsible.
A lot to reflect about. Considerable damage has happened, not the least is a collapse of public trust. Much discussion and debate are needed to restore that trust within government and the public.
Pandemic preparedness has been a fine business for certain segments culminating the the effort called Event 201 which proposed a pathogen considerably more lethal than Covid. So things like the Trusted News Initiative had been built to ensure “necessary” policies had no opposition. Considerable effort in using nudge tools and other ways to influence thought, promote fear and control the public perception were created and used. Sadly, once the actual death rate proved much less than the planning rate, the system was in full gear. Perhaps those at the top understood but the middle managers charged ahead, even now thinking they were being responsible.
A lot to reflect about. Considerable damage has happened, not the least is a collapse of public trust. Much discussion and debate are needed to restore that trust within government and the public.
To back that up:
Cumulative covid deaths by country to date:
Finland 8,967
Denmark 8,316
Norway 5,230
Sweden 23,777
Population:
Finland 5.5m
Denmark 5.8m
Norway 5.4m
Sweden 10.4m
So these countries weren’t “similar” to Sweden at all, at least in terms of population size, so presenting raw Covid death totals as if they were is idiotic. As has been explained to you many times, countries recorded Covid deaths in different ways: even from period to period within the same country data was not always comparable. What is clear is that in Sweden the total excess death rate in the period January 2020 to April 2022 was just +3.7%, compared to an EU average of +12.3%. Never mind the fact that comparing countries’ performance via Covid death league tables implies that nothing else – such as education, social interaction, wider healthcare performance, and economic cost – counts for anything at all.
Delusional. The countries are obviously similar and comparitive in many ways, Sweden has a bigger population but it is very widespread. It’s plain that their lockdown policy needlessly cost many lives – that is the undeniable outcome.
According to your figures, 0.2% of the Swedish population died of (or with) Covid. But maybe if they had shut down their society and economy for 2 years they might have brought that down to 0.1%. Or maybe not. And there would have been no social, economic, healthcare or educational price to pay for doing that. Rightio.
A considerable reduction. In your scenario, our deaths therefore multiply from 227,000 to 454,000! The point being, their lockdown strategy failed. Had the UK taken the same approach deaths would have been multiplied considerably because of our dense population, multi-generational households and wealth divide.
A considerable reduction. In your scenario, our deaths therefore multiply from 227,000 to 454,000! The point being, their lockdown strategy failed. Had the UK taken the same approach deaths would have been multiplied considerably because of our dense population, multi-generational households and wealth divide.
So you don’t think excess deaths are useful information?
Depends what you’re measuring and why.
Excess deaths just show one possible outcome of a Policy. They don’t show you what would have happened without that Policy or via another Policy response instead. They are part of the picture but alone can leave as many questions as answers.
Depends what you’re measuring and why.
Excess deaths just show one possible outcome of a Policy. They don’t show you what would have happened without that Policy or via another Policy response instead. They are part of the picture but alone can leave as many questions as answers.
According to your figures, 0.2% of the Swedish population died of (or with) Covid. But maybe if they had shut down their society and economy for 2 years they might have brought that down to 0.1%. Or maybe not. And there would have been no social, economic, healthcare or educational price to pay for doing that. Rightio.
So you don’t think excess deaths are useful information?
To change the subject Mr Walsh I trust you have now seen the BBC TV documentary’Once upon a time Northen Ireland’ and have noted that so called ‘Bloody Sunday’ was also described by others as ‘Good Sunday’.
I look forward to your abject apology, in the very unlikely event that you have the moral fibre to give one.
This is not the place. But your comment referred to “Bloody or Good Sunday depending on your viewpoint”. 13 people died that day, most of them young. Many more died as result of the security situation spiralling out of control after the massacre. I make no apology for regarding the use of that term in relation to the events of 30th January 1972 as distasteful, offensive, and, quite frankly, lacking in moral fibre.
This is not the place. But your comment referred to “Bloody or Good Sunday depending on your viewpoint”. 13 people died that day, most of them young. Many more died as result of the security situation spiralling out of control after the massacre. I make no apology for regarding the use of that term in relation to the events of 30th January 1972 as distasteful, offensive, and, quite frankly, lacking in moral fibre.
Delusional. The countries are obviously similar and comparitive in many ways, Sweden has a bigger population but it is very widespread. It’s plain that their lockdown policy needlessly cost many lives – that is the undeniable outcome.
To change the subject Mr Walsh I trust you have now seen the BBC TV documentary’Once upon a time Northen Ireland’ and have noted that so called ‘Bloody Sunday’ was also described by others as ‘Good Sunday’.
I look forward to your abject apology, in the very unlikely event that you have the moral fibre to give one.
There’s a lot more going on than the numbers here let on. Not only does Sweden have twice or more the population of each of those other countries, it also over-reported COVID deaths i.e. anyone who had COVID, but died of unrelated causes was reported to have died of COVID. Admittedly, they should perhaps have done more to protect the elderly in nursing homes, but overall compared to other countries, Sweden did not really fare better or worse than those that implemented strict lockdowns. However, because it didn’t close down its economy it is actually faring better than most other countries.
Geez Robbie. You don’t think there’s any issue presenting raw numbers like this without context?
A few things jump out at first glance. Absolute numbers are virtually useless. At the very very minimum, you have to present it as rates per 100,000 or per 1 million.
But even this lacks context. Pandemics kill people in two ways – directly or indirectly. Sweden has one of the better excess mortality rates in the world.
What this also fails to account for is any historical data. Sweden has admitted it failed to protect seniors in any meaningful way during the first few months of the pandemic. Its death rate was one of the highest in the world in the first six months, and then became much better over the course of the pandemic.
And none of this accounts for education outcomes, social disruptions, suicide rates etc…
Using raw numbers like this is not informative at all.
Totally agree. The discussion ought to be around whether lockdowns are the correct approach for any future scenario. They did save a large number of lives, this should not be disputed, the question is, were they worth it?
If you say no, then you have to place the country in the position where our deaths are rocketing and the countries around us are not – then stand up and say ‘our approach is correct’.
It’s 100% reasonable to say lockdowns saved lives. But as you say, the question is if they were worth it. That’s more challenging to prove, but I think it’s obvious they were not worth it, and caused more damage than the disease itself.
Here’s what we know. Covid was very dangerous for a very narrow demographic and health profile – people over the age of 65 and those suffering with multiple health issues.
From what I understand, not one person under the age of 50 in good health died in Israel, one of the most studied countries in the world. This fact alone should invalidate the need for general lockdowns. The more appropriate strategy was that proposed by the authors of Great Barrington Declaration. We knew this by the summer of 2020.
Nearly four years after the start of the pandemic, we are still suffering from inflation – and it doesn’t look to be ending soon. Lockdowns can’t be entirely blamed for inflation, but it wasn’t an issue before the pandemic, and there’s no doubt flooding the world with unproductive money, and supply chain disruptions, are a huge cause. Prolonged inflation isn’t as sexy as Covid, but its impact is devastating and it stretched out the pandemic’s misery.
I could go on and on and on – issues of despair and loneliness, mental health issues, especially for kids, lost education, substance abuse, not treating people with health issues other than Covid.
I fail to see how any reasonable person can think prolonged lockdowns were nothing short of a disaster.
“Lockdowns can’t be entirely blamed for inflation”. I actually think they can. In Western democracies, lockdowns would have been politically impossible without massive increases in government spending – you can’t ban people from working without substituting a good portion of their forfeited income. And for already indebted Western economies only Quantitative Easing could fund massive increases in spending while the economy was simultaneously shut down – without QE, borrowing costs would have jumped, and spending would have to have been curbed, making lockdown unfeasible. But because lockdown scepticism was a low status opinion, professional economists and central bankers were reticent about warning about the associated dangers of inflation.
Ye Gods. You either have a very short memory or a selective one. Literally hundreds of thousands of more people would have died had we followed these morons. Simply unbelievable that here we are looking back that folks could advocate their ideas.
Whet exactly am I not remembering?
Again. Let’s review the facts. Covid was very dangerous for a very small fraction of the population – people over 65 and those suffering from multiple health disorders. Healthy people were simply not at risk from Covid.
I will assume this is true, unless you present evidence otherwise. According to you, the best strategy is to lockdown the entire population, even if they are not at risk from Covid. Yet somehow a strategy of focusing all our efforts at isolating and protecting the population most at risk is reckless and would have led to hundreds of thousands of more deaths.
You need to explain how this works.
Let’s review some more facts. Britain borrowed $300 billion pounds to pay for Covid in 2020. Much of this went to pay people not to work. Instead of paying healthy people to stay home, what if it spent $25 billion or $50 billion protecting vulnerable people? What would that look like?
To be fair, it’s you that needs to explain how this theory works. The ‘vulnerable’ make up as much as a third of the population (including those with conditions etc), how those people can be selectively ‘protected’ or indeed locked down, for considerable lengths of time is an utter mystery – but this is why no country in the world went down that route.
Try to think about it logically. The resources we expended fighting Covid would be much better allocated if they were focused on one third of the population – your unsupported number not mine – instead of the entire population.
All the time, money, manpower and resources devoted to enforcing and monitoring health care for healthy people would be better spent concentrated on people at risk from the disease.
At one point, 80% of Covid deaths in Canada occurred in facilities for seniors. Canada was one of the worst in the world, but every nation in the west failed to protect people in seniors homes. We could have helped more people by concentrating more resources there.
I said lockdowns saved lives. You said hundreds of thousands more people would have died without them. I say people at risk needed to be isolated and the focus of attention. Instead of wasting money paying people to not work, that money would have been better spent creating temporary living accommodations for seniors who couldn’t afford to do it.
You need to explain to me how isolating healthy people saved lives.
So let’s look at some actual numbers in the UK with a GBD lens :
First off, let’s be quite clear – This virus only transmits when people meet.
If you were going to really protect care home residents you would have had to ensure that all their carers and any visitors didn’t meet anyone else – that is that the care homes and their staff were kept in their own bubbles (not mixing with their families) until all the elderly inmates were vaccinated.
1.49 million people in the UK are in receipt of adult social care (private and NHS and Local authority and direct payment recipients). According to Satista about 490,000 of these are in care homes. There are 1.52 million social care workers (potential transmitters to this vulnerable population). Big numbers requiring lots of financial and logistical support in a GBD scenario + a massive sacrifice by direct care workers unless you chose to bribe them with what ? an average junior doctor’s salary perhaps for 1 year ? (Foundation year doctor year 2 £33,345) x 1.52 million care workers = aproximately £ 50 – 51 billion.
This doesn’t include those that are being cared for by immediate family members – about 13.6 million informal carers according to this paper :
COVID-19 and UK family carers: policy implications
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2215036621002066#!
Other numbers pre vaccines :
The population at risk of severe COVID-19 (aged ≥70 years, OR with an underlying health condition with a fully adjusted hazard ratio (HR) of getting severe covid of 1.13 or greater) comprises 18.5 million individuals in the UK, including a considerable proportion of school-aged and working-aged individuals.
According to the Actuaries Friday report # 51 : Priority Groups 1 to 9 i.e. over 50s, Health & Care Staff, Extremely Clinically Vulnerable and “At Risk” amounts to around 31m people.
The UK is an old, sick country. The idea that GBD prescription would have worked in this country is pie in the sky.
Maybe I’m not explaining myself properly. General lockdowns didn’t stop the spread of Covid to elderly and unhealthy people. To argue against the GBD, you have to explain how it would lead to greater exposure to people at risk, even though they are being isolated.
In fact, the only way there could be a dramatic increase in bad outcomes is if isolating at risk people somehow increased interaction between healthy and unhealthy people. I do not agree with that assumption.
A major flaw in our Covid response was not giving options to seniors and unhealthy people living and working with healthy people. We should have given them an option and paid for temporary housing options.
Britain spent $300 billion fighting Covid just in the first year, much of that to pay people to stay at home doing nothing. $50 billion to support and protect people in seniors home would be a drop in the bucket.
Maybe I’m not explaining myself properly. General lockdowns didn’t stop the spread of Covid to elderly and unhealthy people. To argue against the GBD, you have to explain how it would lead to greater exposure to people at risk, even though they are being isolated.
In fact, the only way there could be a dramatic increase in bad outcomes is if isolating at risk people somehow increased interaction between healthy and unhealthy people. I do not agree with that assumption.
A major flaw in our Covid response was not giving options to seniors and unhealthy people living and working with healthy people. We should have given them an option and paid for temporary housing options.
Britain spent $300 billion fighting Covid just in the first year, much of that to pay people to stay at home doing nothing. $50 billion to support and protect people in seniors home would be a drop in the bucket.
So let’s look at some actual numbers in the UK with a GBD lens :
First off, let’s be quite clear – This virus only transmits when people meet.
If you were going to really protect care home residents you would have had to ensure that all their carers and any visitors didn’t meet anyone else – that is that the care homes and their staff were kept in their own bubbles (not mixing with their families) until all the elderly inmates were vaccinated.
1.49 million people in the UK are in receipt of adult social care (private and NHS and Local authority and direct payment recipients). According to Satista about 490,000 of these are in care homes. There are 1.52 million social care workers (potential transmitters to this vulnerable population). Big numbers requiring lots of financial and logistical support in a GBD scenario + a massive sacrifice by direct care workers unless you chose to bribe them with what ? an average junior doctor’s salary perhaps for 1 year ? (Foundation year doctor year 2 £33,345) x 1.52 million care workers = aproximately £ 50 – 51 billion.
This doesn’t include those that are being cared for by immediate family members – about 13.6 million informal carers according to this paper :
COVID-19 and UK family carers: policy implications
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2215036621002066#!
Other numbers pre vaccines :
The population at risk of severe COVID-19 (aged ≥70 years, OR with an underlying health condition with a fully adjusted hazard ratio (HR) of getting severe covid of 1.13 or greater) comprises 18.5 million individuals in the UK, including a considerable proportion of school-aged and working-aged individuals.
According to the Actuaries Friday report # 51 : Priority Groups 1 to 9 i.e. over 50s, Health & Care Staff, Extremely Clinically Vulnerable and “At Risk” amounts to around 31m people.
The UK is an old, sick country. The idea that GBD prescription would have worked in this country is pie in the sky.
Try to think about it logically. The resources we expended fighting Covid would be much better allocated if they were focused on one third of the population – your unsupported number not mine – instead of the entire population.
All the time, money, manpower and resources devoted to enforcing and monitoring health care for healthy people would be better spent concentrated on people at risk from the disease.
At one point, 80% of Covid deaths in Canada occurred in facilities for seniors. Canada was one of the worst in the world, but every nation in the west failed to protect people in seniors homes. We could have helped more people by concentrating more resources there.
I said lockdowns saved lives. You said hundreds of thousands more people would have died without them. I say people at risk needed to be isolated and the focus of attention. Instead of wasting money paying people to not work, that money would have been better spent creating temporary living accommodations for seniors who couldn’t afford to do it.
You need to explain to me how isolating healthy people saved lives.
To be fair, it’s you that needs to explain how this theory works. The ‘vulnerable’ make up as much as a third of the population (including those with conditions etc), how those people can be selectively ‘protected’ or indeed locked down, for considerable lengths of time is an utter mystery – but this is why no country in the world went down that route.
Whet exactly am I not remembering?
Again. Let’s review the facts. Covid was very dangerous for a very small fraction of the population – people over 65 and those suffering from multiple health disorders. Healthy people were simply not at risk from Covid.
I will assume this is true, unless you present evidence otherwise. According to you, the best strategy is to lockdown the entire population, even if they are not at risk from Covid. Yet somehow a strategy of focusing all our efforts at isolating and protecting the population most at risk is reckless and would have led to hundreds of thousands of more deaths.
You need to explain how this works.
Let’s review some more facts. Britain borrowed $300 billion pounds to pay for Covid in 2020. Much of this went to pay people not to work. Instead of paying healthy people to stay home, what if it spent $25 billion or $50 billion protecting vulnerable people? What would that look like?
There is a key psychology behind decisions we have to also recognise before jumping to criticise. Even if one could coldly compute in the ‘eye of a storm’ that better to not do Lockdowns to slow transmissions because long term consequences outweighed short term benefits, it would be v difficult to then watch many more die in the short term as hospitals and services overwhelmed – and die not just of Covid but of other emergency conditions massively compromised by Covid surge taking out capacity.
The human instinct is to immediate ‘rescue’ and not a cold long term calculation, rightly or wrongly. It’s how we find the right balance, including managing what the public expects at the time.
I think this is fair to say about the first wave, when we knew less about the disease. That’s it.
Everything changed when George Floyd was killed in May, 2020, when health officials told us it was okay to go out and protest – and no one in authority pushed back against it.
That facade of their logic for lockdowns was done.
I wouldn’t mix the two subjects up myself. Two emotive issues not conducive to calm thought I think.
Nonetheless I do think many more questions need to be asked about Lockdown 2 and why was that necessary when we had months to be in a better position. Could it have been much more voluntary by then a clear question? There was an increase in hospital admissions and pressure winter 20-21 but could we have avoided that or mitigated in different ways. I think so, but want to hear how Inquiry digs into this.
IDK. I think they’re directly related, in the sense that justification for lockdowns was kicked to the curb. When the letter came out from 1,500 public health officials supporting protests, it was certainly a WTF moment for me.
I agree with 90% of what you say JW however the winter of 20-21 in the UK deserves close examination as it was a living experiment to all intents and purposes.
In early December 2020 while the UK was recovering from its September / October wave there was plenty of messaging about “think carefully about what you are going to do this Christmas” – very Swedish style until Hancock, somewhat late to the game, applied Tier 3 restrictions to over half of England on December 17th.
Clearly, very few people took this on board because the NHS almost but didn’t quite fall over on January 11th 2021, even with all its extra surge capacity in place and a year’s worth of experience of dealing with the virus. From the UK hospitals’ capacity point of view this was the worst moment of the whole pandemic (Thursday 6 January, 2,286 patients were admitted to hospital with COVID-19)
Remember, this virus can only transmit if people meet….over Christmas lunch for instance.
IDK. I think they’re directly related, in the sense that justification for lockdowns was kicked to the curb. When the letter came out from 1,500 public health officials supporting protests, it was certainly a WTF moment for me.
I agree with 90% of what you say JW however the winter of 20-21 in the UK deserves close examination as it was a living experiment to all intents and purposes.
In early December 2020 while the UK was recovering from its September / October wave there was plenty of messaging about “think carefully about what you are going to do this Christmas” – very Swedish style until Hancock, somewhat late to the game, applied Tier 3 restrictions to over half of England on December 17th.
Clearly, very few people took this on board because the NHS almost but didn’t quite fall over on January 11th 2021, even with all its extra surge capacity in place and a year’s worth of experience of dealing with the virus. From the UK hospitals’ capacity point of view this was the worst moment of the whole pandemic (Thursday 6 January, 2,286 patients were admitted to hospital with COVID-19)
Remember, this virus can only transmit if people meet….over Christmas lunch for instance.
I wouldn’t mix the two subjects up myself. Two emotive issues not conducive to calm thought I think.
Nonetheless I do think many more questions need to be asked about Lockdown 2 and why was that necessary when we had months to be in a better position. Could it have been much more voluntary by then a clear question? There was an increase in hospital admissions and pressure winter 20-21 but could we have avoided that or mitigated in different ways. I think so, but want to hear how Inquiry digs into this.
I can see the logic and clarity of your analysis and I wish it was that simple but the problem is the way we think in medicine. As long as we stay principally focussed on illness being caused by infectious agents and ignore (forget) that you can only ‘catch a bug’ when you are receptive (for whatever multiple different reasons : note: we should start examining rather than ignoring), we shall stay in the simple infection-illness paradigm which suits the industry more than the patients. (and is easier to research)
Because of this mainstream paradigm, I cannot expect (it is not possible) that the enquiry comes out with anything useful. The quotes in the above article say it all: wooden tongue speak as they say in French.
We need to replace the likes of Sally Davies and the likes with people who promote the restoration of health rather than the avoiding infectious paradigm..
Sally Davies proposes, as one of many measures, a more efficient production of new antibiotics to solve AMR … which is caused by the use of antibiotics …. I do not hold my breath
I concur we focus too much on illness rather than health. But I don’t think it’s the fault of just a few senior leaders/civil servants. I think there is a basic psychology at work here that effects us all.
We don’t want to be told how to live our lives in a more healthy way and expected to comply, but we do want to be ‘rescued’ when we need. We then get the political decisions we should expect, even if fundamentally failing to grasp the inherent problems with this.
Separately I think a huge problem is also the explosion of single condition Charities and campaign groups. This generates some really good things, but also a tidal wave in the ‘worried well’ which costs and squeezes capacity. Not an easy trend to reverse but perhaps some legislation on drug company funding of such Charities would be a sensible start.
I concur we focus too much on illness rather than health. But I don’t think it’s the fault of just a few senior leaders/civil servants. I think there is a basic psychology at work here that effects us all.
We don’t want to be told how to live our lives in a more healthy way and expected to comply, but we do want to be ‘rescued’ when we need. We then get the political decisions we should expect, even if fundamentally failing to grasp the inherent problems with this.
Separately I think a huge problem is also the explosion of single condition Charities and campaign groups. This generates some really good things, but also a tidal wave in the ‘worried well’ which costs and squeezes capacity. Not an easy trend to reverse but perhaps some legislation on drug company funding of such Charities would be a sensible start.
I think this is fair to say about the first wave, when we knew less about the disease. That’s it.
Everything changed when George Floyd was killed in May, 2020, when health officials told us it was okay to go out and protest – and no one in authority pushed back against it.
That facade of their logic for lockdowns was done.
I can see the logic and clarity of your analysis and I wish it was that simple but the problem is the way we think in medicine. As long as we stay principally focussed on illness being caused by infectious agents and ignore (forget) that you can only ‘catch a bug’ when you are receptive (for whatever multiple different reasons : note: we should start examining rather than ignoring), we shall stay in the simple infection-illness paradigm which suits the industry more than the patients. (and is easier to research)
Because of this mainstream paradigm, I cannot expect (it is not possible) that the enquiry comes out with anything useful. The quotes in the above article say it all: wooden tongue speak as they say in French.
We need to replace the likes of Sally Davies and the likes with people who promote the restoration of health rather than the avoiding infectious paradigm..
Sally Davies proposes, as one of many measures, a more efficient production of new antibiotics to solve AMR … which is caused by the use of antibiotics …. I do not hold my breath
“Lockdowns can’t be entirely blamed for inflation”. I actually think they can. In Western democracies, lockdowns would have been politically impossible without massive increases in government spending – you can’t ban people from working without substituting a good portion of their forfeited income. And for already indebted Western economies only Quantitative Easing could fund massive increases in spending while the economy was simultaneously shut down – without QE, borrowing costs would have jumped, and spending would have to have been curbed, making lockdown unfeasible. But because lockdown scepticism was a low status opinion, professional economists and central bankers were reticent about warning about the associated dangers of inflation.
Ye Gods. You either have a very short memory or a selective one. Literally hundreds of thousands of more people would have died had we followed these morons. Simply unbelievable that here we are looking back that folks could advocate their ideas.
There is a key psychology behind decisions we have to also recognise before jumping to criticise. Even if one could coldly compute in the ‘eye of a storm’ that better to not do Lockdowns to slow transmissions because long term consequences outweighed short term benefits, it would be v difficult to then watch many more die in the short term as hospitals and services overwhelmed – and die not just of Covid but of other emergency conditions massively compromised by Covid surge taking out capacity.
The human instinct is to immediate ‘rescue’ and not a cold long term calculation, rightly or wrongly. It’s how we find the right balance, including managing what the public expects at the time.
But there is no evidence that lockdowns saved lives. It is just a mantra
Yes there is evidence.
From New Zealand in 2020.
See : Excess deaths associated with covid-19 pandemic in 2020: age and sex disaggregated time series analysis in 29 high income countries
https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n1137
Negative excess deaths for the whole of 2020 (except for December). Nice histograms in Figure 1 for you to peruse.
New Zealand is not a proper comparator. Because of the location of the country the were effectively able to exclude all contact with the outside world. In this country the virus was out the gate and running. Also we do not know how many deaths in the UK were due to Covid, the mistreatment of Covid or lockdown
New Zealand is not a proper comparator. Because of the location of the country the were effectively able to exclude all contact with the outside world. In this country the virus was out the gate and running. Also we do not know how many deaths in the UK were due to Covid, the mistreatment of Covid or lockdown
Yes there is evidence.
From New Zealand in 2020.
See : Excess deaths associated with covid-19 pandemic in 2020: age and sex disaggregated time series analysis in 29 high income countries
https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n1137
Negative excess deaths for the whole of 2020 (except for December). Nice histograms in Figure 1 for you to peruse.
It’s 100% reasonable to say lockdowns saved lives. But as you say, the question is if they were worth it. That’s more challenging to prove, but I think it’s obvious they were not worth it, and caused more damage than the disease itself.
Here’s what we know. Covid was very dangerous for a very narrow demographic and health profile – people over the age of 65 and those suffering with multiple health issues.
From what I understand, not one person under the age of 50 in good health died in Israel, one of the most studied countries in the world. This fact alone should invalidate the need for general lockdowns. The more appropriate strategy was that proposed by the authors of Great Barrington Declaration. We knew this by the summer of 2020.
Nearly four years after the start of the pandemic, we are still suffering from inflation – and it doesn’t look to be ending soon. Lockdowns can’t be entirely blamed for inflation, but it wasn’t an issue before the pandemic, and there’s no doubt flooding the world with unproductive money, and supply chain disruptions, are a huge cause. Prolonged inflation isn’t as sexy as Covid, but its impact is devastating and it stretched out the pandemic’s misery.
I could go on and on and on – issues of despair and loneliness, mental health issues, especially for kids, lost education, substance abuse, not treating people with health issues other than Covid.
I fail to see how any reasonable person can think prolonged lockdowns were nothing short of a disaster.
But there is no evidence that lockdowns saved lives. It is just a mantra
Totally agree. The discussion ought to be around whether lockdowns are the correct approach for any future scenario. They did save a large number of lives, this should not be disputed, the question is, were they worth it?
If you say no, then you have to place the country in the position where our deaths are rocketing and the countries around us are not – then stand up and say ‘our approach is correct’.
Population:
Finland 5.5m
Denmark 5.8m
Norway 5.4m
Sweden 10.4m
So these countries weren’t “similar” to Sweden at all, at least in terms of population size, so presenting raw Covid death totals as if they were is idiotic. As has been explained to you many times, countries recorded Covid deaths in different ways: even from period to period within the same country data was not always comparable. What is clear is that in Sweden the total excess death rate in the period January 2020 to April 2022 was just +3.7%, compared to an EU average of +12.3%. Never mind the fact that comparing countries’ performance via Covid death league tables implies that nothing else – such as education, social interaction, wider healthcare performance, and economic cost – counts for anything at all.
There’s a lot more going on than the numbers here let on. Not only does Sweden have twice or more the population of each of those other countries, it also over-reported COVID deaths i.e. anyone who had COVID, but died of unrelated causes was reported to have died of COVID. Admittedly, they should perhaps have done more to protect the elderly in nursing homes, but overall compared to other countries, Sweden did not really fare better or worse than those that implemented strict lockdowns. However, because it didn’t close down its economy it is actually faring better than most other countries.
Geez Robbie. You don’t think there’s any issue presenting raw numbers like this without context?
A few things jump out at first glance. Absolute numbers are virtually useless. At the very very minimum, you have to present it as rates per 100,000 or per 1 million.
But even this lacks context. Pandemics kill people in two ways – directly or indirectly. Sweden has one of the better excess mortality rates in the world.
What this also fails to account for is any historical data. Sweden has admitted it failed to protect seniors in any meaningful way during the first few months of the pandemic. Its death rate was one of the highest in the world in the first six months, and then became much better over the course of the pandemic.
And none of this accounts for education outcomes, social disruptions, suicide rates etc…
Using raw numbers like this is not informative at all.
To back that up:
Cumulative covid deaths by country to date:
Finland 8,967
Denmark 8,316
Norway 5,230
Sweden 23,777
I can’t believe Unherd linked that IEA report, it’s a new low. Lockdown sceptic scientists funded by lockdown sceptic group rehashing old data and cherry picking to produce the result they wanted.
Utter garbage.
Discussing lockdown harms is perfectly valid, but they did save countless lives. If the UK hadn’t have locked down and deaths started to rocket then utter chaos would have ensued. We would have also experienced 400%+ more deaths, just as Sweden did when compared with similar countries.
I can’t believe Unherd linked that IEA report, it’s a new low. Lockdown sceptic scientists funded by lockdown sceptic group rehashing old data and cherry picking to produce the result they wanted.
Utter garbage.
Discussing lockdown harms is perfectly valid, but they did save countless lives. If the UK hadn’t have locked down and deaths started to rocket then utter chaos would have ensued. We would have also experienced 400%+ more deaths, just as Sweden did when compared with similar countries.