COVID-19 Lockdowns Over 10 Times More Deadly Than Pandemic Itself
Revolver Exclusive Study: August 31, 2020
The results are nothing short of staggering, and suggest that the lockdowns will end up costing Americans over 10 times as many years of life as they will save from the virus itself.
For the first time in its history, America has experienced a situation so crippling and perilous that long term financial and social stability have been legitimately threatened.
CHEAT SHEET: Back-of-the-Envelope Calculations Show COVID-19 “Cure” Is Worse Than Disease
👉 Standard approaches to evaluating epidemic policy responses, involving the Value of a Statistical Life, have conceptual problems and are biased towards the elderly and rich.
👉 Using a life-years criterion as an alternative shows that the lockdowns cost an order of magnitude more life-years than they saved.
👉 Most of the publicized cost-benefit analyses of COVID-19 lockdowns have used coarse measures like lives as units rather than life-years, which misleads politicians and the general public. COVID-19 deaths disproportionately impact the oldest members of the population, whereas the economic impacts of lockdowns disproportionately harm the youngest of the working population, who have far greater life expectancies at the time of impact.
👉 Using prior research on workforce entrants and recent graduates entering into a market marred by an economic recession, empirical estimates of life-years lost can be determined. Extensive research on job displacement can be used to estimate the economic impact in life-years of starkly increased unemployment for mid-to-late career workers.
👉 Combining these analyses, we found that an estimated 18.7 million life-years will be lost in the United States due to the COVID-19 lockdowns. Comparative data analysis between nations shows that the lockdowns in the United States likely had a minimal effect in saving life-years. Using two different comparison groups, we estimate that the COVID-19 lockdowns in the U.S. saved between a quarter to three quarters of a million life-years.
👉 Every broad age category lost life-years from the lockdowns including those 55 and older.
👉 The media and state and local governments contributed to the panic by selectively presenting evidence on COVID-19 and shutdowns of dubious benefit.
👉 Public health researchers and health economists gave poor policy advice and made selective use of the prior research literature. They will likely be rewarded, not punished, by academia for their failure because of academia’s biases.
👉 Public health in general is so biased and vulnerable to motivated cognition that it is not “not yet ready for policy analysis.”
https://www.revolver.news/2020/08/study-covid-19-lockdowns-deadlier-than-pandemic-itself/
Revolver Exclusive Study: August 31, 2020
The results are nothing short of staggering, and suggest that the lockdowns will end up costing Americans over 10 times as many years of life as they will save from the virus itself.
For the first time in its history, America has experienced a situation so crippling and perilous that long term financial and social stability have been legitimately threatened.
CHEAT SHEET: Back-of-the-Envelope Calculations Show COVID-19 “Cure” Is Worse Than Disease
👉 Standard approaches to evaluating epidemic policy responses, involving the Value of a Statistical Life, have conceptual problems and are biased towards the elderly and rich.
👉 Using a life-years criterion as an alternative shows that the lockdowns cost an order of magnitude more life-years than they saved.
👉 Most of the publicized cost-benefit analyses of COVID-19 lockdowns have used coarse measures like lives as units rather than life-years, which misleads politicians and the general public. COVID-19 deaths disproportionately impact the oldest members of the population, whereas the economic impacts of lockdowns disproportionately harm the youngest of the working population, who have far greater life expectancies at the time of impact.
👉 Using prior research on workforce entrants and recent graduates entering into a market marred by an economic recession, empirical estimates of life-years lost can be determined. Extensive research on job displacement can be used to estimate the economic impact in life-years of starkly increased unemployment for mid-to-late career workers.
👉 Combining these analyses, we found that an estimated 18.7 million life-years will be lost in the United States due to the COVID-19 lockdowns. Comparative data analysis between nations shows that the lockdowns in the United States likely had a minimal effect in saving life-years. Using two different comparison groups, we estimate that the COVID-19 lockdowns in the U.S. saved between a quarter to three quarters of a million life-years.
👉 Every broad age category lost life-years from the lockdowns including those 55 and older.
👉 The media and state and local governments contributed to the panic by selectively presenting evidence on COVID-19 and shutdowns of dubious benefit.
👉 Public health researchers and health economists gave poor policy advice and made selective use of the prior research literature. They will likely be rewarded, not punished, by academia for their failure because of academia’s biases.
👉 Public health in general is so biased and vulnerable to motivated cognition that it is not “not yet ready for policy analysis.”
https://www.revolver.news/2020/08/study-covid-19-lockdowns-deadlier-than-pandemic-itself/