Covid lockdown Cost/Benefits: A critical assessment of the literature

Abstract

This report reviews a large body of COVID-19 studies on lockdown policies. Many early works used faulty and uninformed assumptions on factors such as the rate of disease spread and the value of statistical life. This led to biased estimates that incorrectly concluded that lockdown benefits outweighed costs. More recent studies, after the accumulation of better data and modeling techniques, generally found that lockdowns had, at best, a marginal effect on reducing deaths. The effectiveness of lockdowns was severely limited as they failed to prevent non-compliance by individuals, and they may have even increased deaths by increasing domestic violence, worsening mental health outcomes, and reducing access to essential healthcare. The biased and flawed early estimates had significant policy implications, as they likely led to excessive and harmful lockdown mandates. – AI-generated abstract.