It has been taken as lore that lockdowns — for all their faults — dramatically stop the spread of COVID-19, such that the cost of those lockdowns pale in comparison to the lives being saved by the communal sacrifice. But as Daniel Andrews announced yesterday that Melbourne’s lockdown is likely to continue, in one form or another, for several months, there is one big problem.
Lockdowns don’t seem to work.
Experts who have taken the time to look at data from lockdowns have discovered that they don’t appear to stop the spread of COVID-19. In fact, when experts compared the data, it appears that lockdowns made no difference at all.
Intuitively this seems contrary to common sense. The Burnet Institute claimed that Victoria’s stage three lockdown “saved” more than 18,000 cases. Its analysis seems to be based on correlation equalling causation.
In other words, the only reason the infection rate dropped was due to lockdown. But analysing infection rates in a single region before and after a lockdown is far from an optimal approach. It’s a bit like giving someone a vaccine, and claiming the vaccine worked because the recipient never got sick.
A far more useful analysis is comparing the results of different regions, some of which locked down, some of which didn’t.
Helpfully, America’s state-by-state approach to lockdowns allow for such a comparison. States like California locked down hard and early, while others like New York delayed before a long, harsh lockdown. Florida and Arizona barely locked down at all.
Donald Luskin of advisory firm TrendMacro undertook analysis of how the different lockdowns impacted infection rates across US states. His finding was counterintuitive: “Lockdowns correlated with a greater spread of the virus. States with longer, stricter lockdowns also had larger COVID outbreaks. The five places with the harshest lockdowns — the District of Columbia, New York, Michigan, New Jersey and Massachusetts — had the heaviest caseloads.”
The obvious concern with that finding is that by the time states like New York finally locked down, the virus had already spread. So Luskin ran the numbers again after states started reopening in April.
The result? “There was a tendency (though fairly weak) for states that opened up the most to have the lightest caseloads. The states that had the big summer flare-ups in the so-called ‘Sunbelt second wave’ — Arizona, California, Florida and Texas — are by no means the most opened up, politicised headlines notwithstanding.”
Luksin noted, “the lesson is not that lockdowns made the spread of COVID-19 worse — although the raw evidence might suggest that — but that lockdowns probably didn’t help and opening up didn’t hurt. This defies common sense. In theory, the spread of an infectious disease ought to be controllable by quarantine. Evidently not in practice, though we are aware of no researcher who understands why not.”
Fellow scientist and entrepreneur TJ Rodgers reached a similar finding in April, stating “we ran a simple one-variable correlation of deaths per million and days to shutdown, which ranged from minus-10 days (some states shut down before any sign of COVID-19) to 35 days for South Dakota, one of seven states with limited or no shutdown. The correlation coefficient was 5.5% — so low that the engineers I used to employ would have summarised it as ‘no correlation’ and moved on to find the real cause of the problem.”
Lyman Stone, adjunct fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, wrote a fascinating article back in April arguing that “it is vitally important that policymakers focus their efforts on policies that do work (masks, central quarantines, travel restrictions, school cancellations, large-assembly limits), and avoid implementing draconian, unpopular policies that don’t work (lockdowns)”.
Stone looked at examples across Europe and the US, noting in Italy that “the death spike in Lombardy had already plateaued or even begun to decline before the region-wide lockdown could have been responsible. Indeed, it appears that the very modest municipal lockdowns of March 1 in extremely hard-hit areas, along with region-wide cancellation of school and large assemblies, may have been the actual trigger for declining deaths. The timing of death declines simply does not match the timing of lockdowns”.
In simple terms: the data across regions show that lockdowns themselves don’t impact the infection rate of COVID-19.
This also happened in Australia. Victoria, which had by far the harshest and longest lockdown during April and May, had virtually all of Australia’s cases in the second wave.
The predictable response to these empirical studies by economists which disprove the efficacy of lockdowns is to dismiss any evidence and point to “medical experts”. So what do the medical experts say? The World Health Organization (WHO) claim that lockdowns are now not the preferred approach. The Telegraph reported that Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, who is head of the WHO’s emerging diseases unit, warned countries against lockdowns, instead favouring a “tailored, specific, localised” response.
Johan Giesecke, who helped guide Sweden’s controversial response to the virus, has been appointed as the deputy chairman of the WHO’s infectious diseases advisory panel. Giesecke noted that in poor countries, “lockdowns cause more problems than they solve”.
Meanwhile German Health Minister Jens Spahn last week conceded that “with the knowledge of today, I can tell you no hairdressers would have to close and no shops … that will not happen again. We won’t need visitor bans in care homes, either.”
The data told us back in April that full lockdowns don’t work, but smart and targeted responses do. The experts from the WHO agree. Sadly it appears no one has bothered to tell Daniel Andrews.
Doesn’t Crikey have any kind of fact-checking? Schwab’s sources aren’t experts of any kind, they are rightwing hacks.
Good on you John. Right wings hacks sums up their qualifications very nicely.
In fact compared to what I think of them and Schwab “right wing hacks” is a generous tribute.
I just get really sick of the way people like Scwabb keep serving this propoganda up at every opportunity. It makes me incredibly nauseous and as you can probably gather from this rant, incredibly angry.
The problem is these oily ticks have been doing this stuff and getting away with it for the last ffifty years. They have destroyed manufacturing in the US, they have ensured that east Asia will rule in the 21 century and they have destroyed the middle and working classes. They also killed off the liberal class that used to act as the damper of their baser instincts and crimes.
Unfettered capitalism as Marx said is a revolutionary force. Marx may have been an unrealistic utopian when devising solutions to inequality, but he was spot on about unfettered capitalism. It has within it the seeds of it’s own destruction and they will make bloody sure they take all of us with them.
The WHO are right wing hacks? Good one John.
To be candid, Adam, the WHO have put a match to both ends of the candle. From inception, the governors have sought a dollar each way from the perspectives of current and future aid to their, respective, countries.
Mate, I could recommend a couple of texts but have a crack yourself as to the characteristics of epidemics. A primer on cell biology might be useful and the outlay (Crikey reimbursed?) would not be much.
As Erasmums says, the WHO statement has two bob each way. It says something like ” national lockdowns were necessary at first, but now we should go for localised responses to outbreaks”. That seems pretty close to the actual position in Australia. The claim that lockdowns don’t work relies entirely on rightwing hacks, as I said. Why do you cite such obviously bogus sources?
See my substantive reply to this article. The problem that Schwab seems to have is that of a high school crammer; the gist is kinda understood but not the detail and hence the result in the approaching test.
Schwab (or anyone) is entitled to ask “is the current policy rational / optimal / effective / constructive ../etc” BUT (as Ruv pointed out last week) the answer is by no means simple; in fact the answer is rather complicated.
Again (appealing to Ruv) one has to ask (for either side of the question) (1) what would establish the truth of proposition and, equally, (2) what is sufficient to falsify the proposition for any discussion to have any significance.
“Adam Schwab is a commentator, business director, and the co-founder of LuxuryEscapes.com.” On what basis does this mean he is qualified to have his various column classified by Crikey under the “Health” category.
Now, to question his arguments. If lockdowns don’t work, how does he explain Victoria’s daily case rate dropping form 725 to 41 in about a month under the Stage 4 restrictions? Also, if lockdowns don’t work, how does he explain the rapid increase in case numbers in Victoria as restrictions were eased in late May early June?
Yes and he still has a position in Luxury Escapes according to Linkedin (ie “. Want to work with us? Message me.”)
It’s clearly in his interest to influence the debate in favour of opening up restrictions. A clear conflict of interest having him writing these articles.
Oh and btw I think New Zealand is doing pretty well despite the recent outbreak. They are a country that locked down hard and fast.
Their economy has weathered this crisis better than us, too.
Well, good thing it is disclosed every time he writes about this. Or are people not allowed to argue for their interests now?
I agree, people love a cheap shot though.
Even those arguing for their own interests *should* be required to provide a coherent argument backed by solid facts. Doubly so given that Crikey tries to promote itself as better than the Mainstream Media. This should have a loud disclaimer of “Advertorial” at the top of article, not the self-interest of the author being revealed at the very bottom-in relatively fine print.
Meaningful disclosure happens at the top of a piece like this.
And stupidly with 4 cases.
Nobody has a crystal ball to see what would have happened with a smarter less draconian approach. Maybe we’d be at zero?
So a quick google of “Do Lockdowns work?” seem to find an equivalent amount of research and empirical data that suggests they do work and are the most effective way to deal with an emerging threat like Covid-19.
This isn’t surprising, as we’re in the storm and don’t really have the longitudinal data to draw meaningful conclusions because it just hasn’t been long enough.
I find it very unsettling ro see Crikey print this piece – quite apart from author’s credentials, conflict of interest (or lack thereof). It’s a bit of a give-away that the author first says, dismissing a report on the Victoria lockdown’s reduction of cases that “Its analysis seems to be based on correlation equalling causation”, and then proceeds to cite three counter-arguments that are themselves based on correlation. With so many real experts out there, why did Crikey indulge Mr. Schwab?
Schwab uses Donald Luskin of TrendMacro as his go-to source. This would be the same uber-libertarian Donald Luskin referred to by eminent economics professor Brad deLong as the ‘stupidest man alive’ and who proclaimed the day after Lehman Bros’ collapse that ‘anyone who says we’re headed into a recession’ was ‘making up their own definition of recession’ – thereby achieving international renown as the origin of one of the 10 worst predictions of 2007. Perhaps Adam could consider using an equivalent source even more attuned to his way of thinking, such as Malcolm Roberts.
According to Wikipedia it was the day before Lehman’s collapse in 2008, not the day after, that Luskin made his sterling prediction regarding the American economy. Perhaps merely dropping out of Yale makes one a fellow scientist to an actual scientist but I prefer to think of it as like being in love or a Harvard graduate : you never have to say sorry.
The reason Schwab and his ilk do as they do, H, is they don’t want anyone to focus on the real questions, such as;
‘How were things ‘trending’ before the virus came along?’, and
‘Does any nation do things differently to the developed West and, if so, how have they coped?
I suggest this chap for answers to those and other pertinent questions;
https://michael-hudson.com/2020/08/how-an-act-of-god-pandemic-is-destroying-the-west/
Óne thing ‘Ol’ Mick’ doesn’t mention in that, but has done many times before, and within the context of his entire argument, is around a century ago, about 5% of US GDP was attributed to the ‘finance industry and services’.
That figure is now ballpark 40%.
‘Around a century ago’ tractors were replacing horses that were consuming about 20% of the forage. Two major changes occurred. Farm production increased greatly and processed food developed.
The second major change occurred with the 1st world (except for a few exceptions – Oz and NZ being notable) replacing primary industry with secondary (manufacturing) industry. Despite industuralisation food became cheap (relatively) for the first time ever. Until then a portly man was typically very wealthy.
From circa the late 60s the principal source of GDB was from tertiary (services) industry.
Thanks for the link, David, but Hudson over-generalises on debt with regard to the PRC. Agreed, different rules (and criteria) are applied to what one might encounter in a finance course at a western university but it is much more than a Hammurabi policy operating from the sidelines. This is something than not even the WSJ comprehends.
However, on that point, David, a “real” major trade war between the USA and the PRC would impoverish everyone but I don’t think I have the space here (3,000 words easily) to put it into bite-sized chunks. That the PRC will rebound relatively unscathed will annoy the hell out of Uncle Sam.
There is the opportunity of co-operation but Trump wants a zero-sum game.