Public health’s NPIs were ineffective and unsustainable but at least they crashed the global economy:

“I think that we are probably going to move into a decade of very, very poor growth in which developed economies are going to find themselves lucky with 1% growth per annum, if they are able to achieve it, and what is more unfortunate than everything else is with elevated levels of inflation,” Lacalle said.

“I think that we are living the backlash of massive stimulus packages that were implemented in 2020 and 2021. That has not delivered the kind of potential growth that many economists expected.”

Source: Global economy is heading into a decade of low growth, economist says

Shutting down the economy was not sustainable without causing more harm. And ultimately, it was not possible to stop a highly contagious virus from spreading. Flooding the market with cash has led to high inflation: 

Coldstreams