One of the great mysteries of the pandemic is why so many countries followed China’s example. In the U.S. and the U.K. especially, lockdowns went from being regarded as something that only an authoritarian government would attempt to an example of “following the science.” But there was never any science behind lockdowns — not a single study had ever been undertaken to measure their efficacy in stopping a pandemic. When you got right down to it, lockdowns were little more than a giant experiment.
COVID Lockdowns Were a Giant Experiment. It Was a Failure. (nymag.com)
Not only did they fail but they violated the principles of ethical research – there was no informed consent of those were mandated to participate in a mass population experiment. There was no prior study indicating lock downs would work (and they didn’t). At best, lock downs could delay cases by a few days or weeks, temporarily. But that was not the message the public health quacks promulgated – instead, they implied we could end the pandemic through lock downs and NPIs. Which was a lie.
