LOCKDOWNS NOT GOOD TACTIC

Re: “Strict bug curves lifted state economies”, (Opinion, June 30).

I am not sure what this analysis contributes as a massive stimulus programme was introduced in 2020 worth some US$3.1 billion (about 96 billion baht) leading to the largest ever US government deficit, more than 15% of GDP.

Putting free money in people’s pockets can only go on for so long.

The pick and choose correlations do not add to any robustness to this opinion piece; neither does the comparison to Nordic countries.

The sensitive approach by the Swedish government resulted in a 1.5% age standardised excess mortality while other Scandinavian countries actually showed negative rates during 2020.

So, if we pick and choose some of the hard lockdown countries around, the United Kingdom had 10.5% excess mortality while running up a huge government debt and still having GDP contracting close to 10% while excess deaths in the US in 2020 were 12.9%.

France and Germany had more than double the excess mortality of Sweden while running up big deficits as well as running their economies into the ground.

The Nordic countries did better on the economic front and Sweden a tad better than the others in terms of GDP contraction and government deficits.

I am not sure whether “citizens, you are on your own, choose wisely” would describe the Swedish approach with less restriction of people’s freedoms and not criminalising its citizens’ actions.

They also provide recommendations and actionable information.

The information available shows that a vast majority of those who died with Covid were in the age bracket of 80-89 years; the fatality rate of people below the age of 60 is 0.05%.

That suggests closing down construction sites for young and able workers and forcing them back to their parent’s home is not a good strategy to reduce the Covid mortality rate.

Dr Hansson