Who would have thought it? A new landmark meta-study by researchers at Johns Hopkins University and Sweden’s Lund University has concluded that that draconian restrictions imposed on the British population in the spring of 2020 saved fewer than 1,700 lives in England and Wales and were “a drop in the bucket compared to the staggering collateral costs”. The Telegraph has more.
Scientists from Johns Hopkins University and Lund University examined almost 20,000 studies on measures taken to protect populations against Covid across the world.
Their findings suggest that lockdowns in response to the first wave of the pandemic, when compared with less strict policies adopted by the likes of Sweden, prevented as few as 1,700 deaths in England and Wales. In an average week there are around 11,000 deaths in England and Wales.
The report authors said their findings showed that the draconian measures had a “negligible impact” on Covid mortality and were a “policy failure of gigantic proportions”.
Johns Hopkins is one of the most respected medical schools in the world and became known during the pandemic for its Covid dashboard measuring cases and deaths all over the world.
The study’s authors conclude: “The science of lockdowns is clear; the data are in: the deaths saved were a drop in the bucket compared to the staggering collateral costs imposed.”
The detrimental impact of lockdown on children’s health and education, on economic growth and its contribution to large increases in public debt has become increasingly clear since the policy was introduced.
However, The Telegraph recently revealed that a secretive government unit worked with social media companies during the pandemic in an attempt to curtail criticism of controversial lockdown policies.
The Covid Disinformation Unit monitored social media and asked tech companies to remove posts it considered to be “potentially harmful content”.
Britain’s first lockdown, in March 2020, was introduced on the basis of modelling exercises from Prof Neil Ferguson which had predicted there could be more than 500,000 deaths in the UK, without action to stop the spread of the virus.
Read More: Lockdown Benefits “Drop in the Bucket Compared to the Costs”, Landmark Study Finds
