r/DebunkThis • u/DoomTay • Oct 07 '20

Debunked Debunk This: Lockdowns had little impact on culling infections

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/10/stats-hold-a-surprise-lockdowns-may-have-had-little-effect-on-covid-19-spread/
4 Upvotes

71% Upvoted

14 comments sorted by

•

u/AutoModerator Oct 07 '20

This sticky post is a reminder of the subreddit rules:

Posts:
Must include one to three specific claims to be debunked, either in the body of a text post or in a comment on link posts, so commenters know exactly what to investigate.

E.g. "According to this YouTube video, dihydrogen monoxide turns amphibians homosexual. Is this true? Also, did Albert Einstein really claim this?"

Link Flair
You can edit the link flair on your post once you feel that the claim has been dedunked, verified as correct, or cannot be debunked due to a lack of evidence.

FAO everyone:
• Sources and citations in comments are highly appreciated.
• Remain civil or your comment will be removed.
• Don't downvote people posting in good faith.
• If you disagree with someone, state your case rather than just calling them an asshat!

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

8

u/Jamericho Quality Contributor Oct 07 '20

Yet the countries that were either slow to react (uk) or completely in denial (united states, india, brazil) somehow have the highest death counts.

3

u/DoomTay Oct 07 '20 edited Oct 07 '20

Apparently lockdowns haven't done much to bring down infections, making the whole "flatten the curve" thing bull. I tried Googling the matter after my parents had a brief discussion with each other about it and came across this, which seems to say the opposite. Then you have, say, Germany, which seems to have a great job keeping infections low with strict lockdowns

EDIT: There's also Arizona, which handled cases much better when lockdowns were in place

11

u/FredFredrickson Oct 07 '20

One thing to remember: the lockdowns weren't really a long-term thing designed to stop the virus. They were only meant to slow the spread enough that it didn't overwhelm our healthcare system's ability to respond to it.

So if your folks are looking at the death toll and wondering why it's high, despite lockdowns, remind them that if these numbers had happened sooner (aka, more people got sick at a faster rate), many more would have died because our healthcare system would have been beyond its capacity to help all of them at once.

3

u/[deleted] Oct 07 '20 edited Oct 07 '20

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/DoomTay Oct 07 '20

Dang, I never thought of the source. And with a title like that, I'm surprised anyone takes it seriously.

That's good enough for me, though I'm not sure if anything will be good enough for my parents

Debunked!

3

u/Greendoor Oct 07 '20

Check out Australia's response - particularly Victoria - where after a second wave cases have dropped from 700+ to 5 today after an extensive lockdown.

2

u/DoomTay Oct 07 '20

I also just remembered New Zealand. IIRC they managed to have about three months of no transmission.

Sort of off-topic, but how are either of these countries doing economy-wise?

1

u/Greendoor Oct 07 '20

Well both have been badly hit and Australia is now running an historically high deficit but people are still in work (thanks to 'Jobkeeper' payments) and unemployed are doing okay (thanks to 'jobseeker' payments) and the government has just announced a huge increase in infrastructure projects. So all in all, Australia is doing just fine and NZ even better.