Did the costs of lockdown outweigh the benefits? Numerous analyses have concluded ‘yes’. However, these were all carried out by academics or independent researchers. To my knowledge, no Western government has published a cost-benefit analysis of lockdown (presumably due to what it might show).
In an unpublished paper, the economic consultant L. Jan Reid has attempted a cost-benefit analysis of lockdown in the United States. He in fact reports two separate analyses: first, what he calls a “traditional analysis”; and second, what he calls his “preferred analysis”.
Reid’s traditional analysis makes the unrealistic assumption that every life lost is valued equally at $7.8 million (which is the average value from a list of published estimates). It yielded a benefit/cost ratio slightly greater than one, suggesting the lockdowns were worth it. On the other hand, three out of four sensitivity analyses yielded benefit/cost ratios of less than one.
By contrast, Reid’s preferred analysis makes the much more realistic assumption that the value of lives lost decreases with age, such that each 20 year old represents a loss of $11 million, whereas each 70 year old represents a loss of $1.5 million.
To estimate the total benefits of lockdown, he multiplies the estimated number of lives saved in each age-group by the ‘economic value of life’ for that age-group, and then sums the values across all age-groups.
When calculating the costs of lockdown, Reid includes the hit to GDP, money spent on federal stimulus programs, lives lost from the restrictions themselves, and several other items. Overall, his preferred analysis yields a benefit/cost ratio far below one, indicating that the lockdowns weren’t worth it.
While I suspect Reid overestimates lives lost from the restrictions themselves, the benefit/cost ratio is still below one even excluding this particular item. What’s more, he uses a very liberal estimate of the number of lives saved by lockdowns – approximately two million. The true figure, I would guess, is substantially less than this.
Reid concludes that the “cost of the lockdowns was up to 10 times greater than the benefits”. You may not agree with all his assumptions, but the paper is worth reading in full.
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I think you have to weight the cost of a life in favour of the young. Any other approach seems unnatural.
Any analysis that doesn’t include a notional cost of lost liberty on the cost side is severely lacking. Governments pay people compensation for wrongful imprisonment.
LOCKDOWN DON’T Work – they kill old people they don’t save old people
Mask don’t work
Where Are the Scientific Studies for Universal Masking?
Why Masks Are a Charade Analysis by Dr. Joseph Mercola
https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2021/08/23/masks-are-charade.aspx?ui=1fb065e0c4152b58bd4ed94cf29c7cbfad40307fb723460ddabacd55f3c58b0c&sd=20210518&cid_source=dnl&cid_medium=email&cid_content=art1HL&cid=20210823&mid=DM965507&rid=1242686923
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Ouch! I’m hoping that the Daily Sceptic looks with disfavor at the citing of dens of kookery like mercola.com
Yes, there’s a reason they used to say women and children first. Of course that doesn’t mean the old don’t matter or that we should euthanise them. But any adult who puts their own life before children’s should be ashamed.
I’m 74. I have 5 granddaughters aged between 22 and 7. Let’s face it, their likely value to society far outweighs mine. They should have been the priority over the last 18 months. I have my degrees and professional qualifications, I have worked but have been retired for years, therefore I do not make an valuable contribution to the national economy. They have had their futures blighted by the over 50s politicians who have also had their chance to learn. I am a drain – they have a productive lfe ahead of them, in spite of the last 18 months. I don’t want to be got rid of, but I am clear headed enough to know that my value is far less than theirs.
Those preferred value numbers still seem ridiculously high – no doubt to try and get the correct answer.
Do they mention the value of someone who will die in the next month covid or no covid?
My guess is we’d soon come to the obvious conclusion without having to conduct a study.
Removed. Rephrased as a top-level comment,
This sort of analysis does very little to convince people one way or the other.
There are so many arbitrary assumptions like the value of each life or the number of people “saved” that if one disagrees with the conclusions one need only take a few shots at the assumptions and retreat back into the comfort of one’s firmly held belief.
What is the assumption about “lives saved” (by shielding measures)? How do these experts determine this estimate? Seems to me the only way you could calculate “lives saved” would be to compare two similar nations that used completely opposite mitigation strategies – One nation did essentially nothing and another did essentially everything. Then you compare the fatalities from COVID.
Unfortunately, we have only one nation – Sweden – in the “placebo” group to perform such “scientific” comparisons. Still, this one comparison does reveal that there is no statistically significant difference in deaths in Sweden to most of the other countries that did use all the lockdown measures, especially when you look at the age cohorts before retirement age.
In America, one could compare mortality data from Alabama – which had much more stringent mitigation mandates – than its neighboring state of Florida. Florida has better mortality statistics on a per capita basis than Alabama. And Florida has more elderly citizens than any state in the union except maybe California.
In other words, more lives were seemingly “saved” in Florida than in Alabama. But this comparison doesn’t fit the narrative, so we can’t use it, I guess.
https://www.covidchartsquiz.com/state-vs-state
Covid charts quiz. Spot the mask mandates and the lockdowns…
So even better still when you look at age groups
There is no benefit in lockdown because communism has no benefits, mediaeval superstition has no benefits.
Oh dear. Political illiteracy strikes again. What we’ve got ain’t ‘communism’ by any stretch of the imagination.
Lockdown is communist, it is a policy imported from a communist dictatorship that has concentration camps.
No, we don’t have communism.
Communist countries didn’t have communism either.
Some more equal, were they?
No, it’s fascism!
Reminds me of that sketch about comminazis.
The only similarity I see is that neither works.
Both communism and medieval superstition seem to lead away from Liberty and towards our current economic model namely Feudalism (although it’s more stealthily done, even though economic-rent is at at historical high).
There was a story a few years back about Europe’s last feudal society (Sark, I think) coming to an end. Didn’t stay away long, did it?
On the contrary, communism always works, it always succeeds in achieving its goal of destruction for the sake of destruction.
Were any lives ‘saved’. Most commentators, even ‘pro lockdown’ ones seem to say all that happens is the can is kicked further down the road. The impact on overall mortality is minimal at best.
Quite. Given the age and co-morbidity profiles of deaths of/with Covid, the likelihood is that a high proportion of these “saved” people would have died anyway soon, either due to Covid catching up with them or to their existing age/conditions.
We haven’t really saved any lives, which can be verified by looking at the all-cause mortality figures. There is no exceptional about last year in terms of deaths
In a rational world, the latest all cause mortality from Belarus would surely be seen as conclusive (I suppose the BBC didn’t cover it…).
No, of course not. The lives “saved” by lockdowns (which I don’t believe) are more than outweighed by the ones lost by all manner of other conditions, some of which have not yet been able to be calculated (how many suicides, deaths from mental illness, bankruptcy, consistent abuse etc). hese are long term figures, which will not become evident for years.
To the rational mind, it is clear that lockdowns ‘weren’t worth it’. There are simply no significant benefits that can be pinned down, whilst the horrendous costs are plain to see.
But … all these analyses depend on the ‘assumptions’ that are made, and then turned into further assumptions about very dodgy monetary equivalents.
The real problem is that governments in general have made no attempt to analyse the immense obvious penalties of lockdowns against the lack of any claimed and unobvious benefits.
Basically, the exercise is fundamentally flawed.
European COVID-19 Vaccine adverse reactions report.
How’s that line up (in terms of numbers jabbed in the EU vassal states) with the UK’s 1500+ jab victims?
It doesn’t.
I’m convinced our total deaths post-vaccination are too low. At a rough guess, at a minimum it should be at least double, and possibly much higher than that, if we assume only 10% of adverse reactions are recorded.
30 day FB ban for posting this!!!!
The real cost, the human cost, the psychological and spiritual cost, has been incalculable.
People are not numbers or economic units.
Seems to me, we need to make just two observations:
Therefore, the “life cost” of Covid19 is zero and the benefits of the Covid19 response is zero.
Disclaimer: Getting on a bit myself, so I’m heading into the higher-chance end.
I’m 74. My 5 granddaughters matter more in terms of the future than I do. I’ve had my working and academic life, my qualifications, my youth (long, long ago) and it they who should have been prioritised. Blow the emotive response of stupid, politicians and so called experts (who are nothing of the kind) that we mustn’t “kill Granny”. This grandma thinks the young should have been prioritised. I don’t want to die, but I am less valuable than they area and to say otherwise is irrational.
Re: The “lives saved” assumption all we can do is look at the ONE “placebo” nation that did not implement “shielding” measures to save lives or slow spread. This nation of course is Sweden.
In the entire nation of Sweden, fewer than 100 people under the age of 40 have died of COVID.
Sweden has more than 14,000 deaths but the average age of a COVID victim is 82.
Apparently, FEWER people under 70 died in Sweden than in nations that went all in on lockdowns. So one could validly argue that no lives were “saved” by the mitigation mandates.
Yes, the benefit side looks to be zero or negative. I’d say it’s very hard to prove to any reasonable degree there was any benefit, so the assumption is that it was zero. The cost side is easier in that whatever approach you take, it’s going to be massive. In truth, the calculation can be done on the back of a postage stamp.
The economic value of a life is assigned and adjusted according to age. Reid’s calculation considers deaths in terms of economic loss. But might not the creeps behind this scam, have looked at the vulnerable (very old, frail, obese) and seen a value to be gained from their deaths?
So even as a decaying old bat I am worth 1.5 million dollars?lHow much does thirty pieces of silver go into 1.5 million dollars?
In my opinion, doing a cost-benefit analysis of lockdowns is fundamentally misguided because it implicitly accepts the assumption the people are essentially the same as cattle, hence, manageing them in them same way is principally ok and the only question here is whether or nor a particular attempt at manageing peoplecattle was efficient.
I’m not a cow. I object to being treated as such. In particular,
I could continue this list, but these are the three most important points which came to my mind.
Meanwhile: in the Philippines, draconian lockdowns continue.
https://mailchi.mp/tomwoods/goodbadnews?e=8e86beb5bb
“due to the so-called “delta” variant, citizens are expected to remain at home for two weeks (a tired trope by now) and may only exit their residences for essential items with a quarantine pass (one per household). Outdoor exercise was allowed until yesterday, but the authorities probably got spooked into banning it when they saw people still outside enjoying themselves (or trying to be healthy) and not cowering in fear at home.”
In New Zealand, lockdowns have been extended. Parliament suspended. Dissidents rounded up, or getting visits from the police for “re-education”, and Jacinda Ardern has sent $3million to the Taliban.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tb0uDUGU50Y
In Australia, there have been large public protests, and the police have used pepper spray and rubber bullets in response.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bD5-1Z1LXeU
Truckers in Australia are planning to bring Australia to a halt, telling people to stock up on food for at least two weeks.
Would anyone have believed this back in 2019??
Bears. Woods. Popes. Catholics. Fictional Detectives and Excrement. FIGHT. BACK. BETTER. Useful information, links and resources: https://www.LCAHub.org/
2 million lives saved by lockdowns? I don’t see how this can possibly be credible, looking at all cause mortality from Belarus. No lockdowns, no restrictions, no disaster.
Lockdowns were worth it. Not to me or society as a whole. The elite has achieved exactly what they wanted…fear and control. It was planned and they probably can’t believe how stupid and compliant society actually is…and how easy it was to achieve their aim.
In the UK government’s document “The tolerability of risk from nuclear power stations” first published by the HSE in 1988 (last revised 1992) there is a UK government department estimated value put on a human life:
“The Department of Transport’s consultation exercise secured widespread endorsement for its proposed value of life for application in road transport appraisal. This value now stands at £660 000 for a life.”
Adjusted for inflation 1992 to 2021 yields £1,320,000 ($1,810,000). This is less than one quarter the estimate of $7.8 million used in the study by L. Jan Reid.
Well, d’uh!