FEE’s Jon Miltimore writes, In Australia, “residents are entering the ninth week of a lockdown that had initially been scheduled for two weeks. In many of the hardest-hit parts of the city, NBC reports, military personnel roam the streets and authorities issue fines of up to $3,700 to individuals breaking lockdown orders…

The policy has resulted in violent clashes between police and lockdown protesters, but public health officials have defended the policy, which is expected to last at least through September.

The decision by New Zealand and Australia to lockdown—and stay in lockdown as the virus spreads—fits a familiar pattern.

In 2020, numerous governments around the world went into lockdown to attempt to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. In the United States, public health officials created a ’15 days to slow the spread’ campaign—which quickly devolved, in many places, into indefinite closures of all economic sectors deemed ‘non-essential.’

The results of lockdowns were catastrophic—millions of job losses, millions of businesses destroyed, surging drug overdoses, increased youth suicide and depression, and a massive decrease in cancer screenings, among them. Globally, as many as 150 million people are expected to slip into extreme poverty, according to the World Bank.

Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a professor at Stanford University Medical School, recently called lockdowns the ‘biggest public health mistake we’ve ever made.’

‘The harm to people is catastrophic,’ said Bhattacharya.

The harms would be bad enough, but an abundance of evidence also suggests the lockdowns were ineffective at containing the virus.”

Read the entire column.

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