Lockdown incentivized politicians to establish positions on a lockdown, which has led to people having strong opinions about it. Even assuming no damage from further polarization, we have a roughly 50% chance of having an anti-lockdown government when the next pandemic hits, with a 10% chance of this new incentive being the deciding factor in not enacting a lockdown (or failing to implement it). Even if we assume that only 10% of the effects of this polarization is the result of the lockdown actually happening, with a 1% yearly chance of a pandemic more dangerous in expectation than the current one (~100M dead), we have ~1M QALYs lost, extrapolated worldwide over the next 10 years (while this effect is most pronounced).
Note: This is just a quick check to see that the effect is at least plausibly on an order of magnitude worth taking into consideration. I’m only somewhat confident that the effect isn’t in the opposite direction. I’m only commenting (as opposed to answering) because primarily I expect weak points in my general process of speculation pointed out, not because I believe this to be well-informed enough to be useful.
I mean, a lot of it I think has to do with the lockdown rules being fairly obviously being written by the dumbest people in the room.
As a couple of examples, here where I am they shut down all “nonessential” jobs and it rapidly became clear that they had no idea what was actually essential and no idea what actually spread the virus. Specifically:
Automotive repair shops were shut down entirely for months. It’s as if they had no conception that all those “essential” transport jobs to get food back to the stores actually have to do vehicle maintenance. It wasn’t until shipping started to take a hit that they actually listened to complaints.
“non-essential” rural workers taking advantage of the down time to catch up on maintenance were having jack-booted thugs show up on their property (in the middle of nowhere, with no workers who didn’t live on-premises) and order them to cease working and go sit inside their homes because somehow that would make everyone safer. Never mind that these people’s only possible exposure would have been coming directly from the aforementioned jackboots.
Logging and mining operations that go weeks on end with little to no outside contact ordered to shut down and send all their people home, despite the fact that those people were almost certainly at less risk of exposure working in a remote region than back in the city or town.
I expect it’ll be less an anti-lockdown backlash than an anti-idiot backlash. But people may have a hard time differentiating the two.
Lockdown incentivized politicians to establish positions on a lockdown, which has led to people having strong opinions about it. Even assuming no damage from further polarization, we have a roughly 50% chance of having an anti-lockdown government when the next pandemic hits, with a 10% chance of this new incentive being the deciding factor in not enacting a lockdown (or failing to implement it). Even if we assume that only 10% of the effects of this polarization is the result of the lockdown actually happening, with a 1% yearly chance of a pandemic more dangerous in expectation than the current one (~100M dead), we have ~1M QALYs lost, extrapolated worldwide over the next 10 years (while this effect is most pronounced).
Note: This is just a quick check to see that the effect is at least plausibly on an order of magnitude worth taking into consideration. I’m only somewhat confident that the effect isn’t in the opposite direction. I’m only commenting (as opposed to answering) because primarily I expect weak points in my general process of speculation pointed out, not because I believe this to be well-informed enough to be useful.
I mean, a lot of it I think has to do with the lockdown rules being fairly obviously being written by the dumbest people in the room.
As a couple of examples, here where I am they shut down all “nonessential” jobs and it rapidly became clear that they had no idea what was actually essential and no idea what actually spread the virus. Specifically:
Automotive repair shops were shut down entirely for months. It’s as if they had no conception that all those “essential” transport jobs to get food back to the stores actually have to do vehicle maintenance. It wasn’t until shipping started to take a hit that they actually listened to complaints.
“non-essential” rural workers taking advantage of the down time to catch up on maintenance were having jack-booted thugs show up on their property (in the middle of nowhere, with no workers who didn’t live on-premises) and order them to cease working and go sit inside their homes because somehow that would make everyone safer. Never mind that these people’s only possible exposure would have been coming directly from the aforementioned jackboots.
Logging and mining operations that go weeks on end with little to no outside contact ordered to shut down and send all their people home, despite the fact that those people were almost certainly at less risk of exposure working in a remote region than back in the city or town.
I expect it’ll be less an anti-lockdown backlash than an anti-idiot backlash. But people may have a hard time differentiating the two.