The price of lockdown: lives lost today vs. those cut short due to tragedies of the past

 In this post, we will be looking at the impact of COVID-19 and that of the imposed lockdown and compare to other events in history.

Lives lost to COVID-19 deaths
So far, COVID-19 has killed about one million people worldwide. Each person lost, on average, 2 years of life expectancy. Most patients were old and had preexisting conditions that placed them, on average, 2 years before their natural deaths.

Thus, about 2 million person years have been lost to corona.

Lives lost to COVID-19 sickness
If we look at the 25 million confirmed cases and assume each person lost 2 weeks of their life being sick, we have another million person years.

We should, maybe, consider that, perhaps half a billion people were actually sick, so the number of years lost to illness is probably much greater — perhaps 20 million person years.

Thus, the bulk of the loss is not in the people dying, but in the time spent home being sick.

The world however, overemphasizes the loss of life through death and cares little about the time wasted at home with a fever or other forms of discomfort due to the virus. We shall thus do the same.

Lives lost due to the worldwide disturbance created by COVID-19
The Coronavirus has triggered a worldwide disturbance. On average, most places have been locked down for about 2 months. The world population is nearly 8 billion people. If only 6 billion are affected by the lockdown, the cost should be about one billion person years. That is 500 times more than the numbers of years lost by the people who actually died of Corona so far.

Lives lost in other events throughout history
The Holocaust. For comparison, about 6 million lives were lost in the Holocaust. On average, each victim lost about 30 years. Thus, we’re talking about 180 million person years, or one fifth of the cost of Corona quarantine worldwide.

In Europe alone, we've lost half as many life years as in the Holocaust to the COVID-19 lockdown, whereas the people who died of COVID-19 lost only 1% of the life years lost to the Holocaust. 

If we take into account that the years lost to COVID-19 were mostly terminal end-of-life care and both the Holocaust and the lockdown robbed people of all ages of mostly good years, the difference is even greater and the absurdity of these measures more pronounced. 

We are just beginning to see the effects of the world-wide economic depression caused by lockdown, of the mental breakdown of the children held out of school and in front of their phones or computers for most hours of the day, and of the older folk who limited their movement so much that they lost ability to move. We also don't see the wars or the resulting hunger as of yet. We see some people on the streets protesting, but most of the developed world is still comfortable even if most are too afraid to eat out or go on vacations.

Natural mortality in lockdown vs. COVID-19 mortality
People live about 1000 months -- think 100 years with roughly 10 months in a year. They die once in a lifetime, so 1 in 1000 average people will die every month. Thus, for a 2 month quarantine, the natural mortality rate is 0.2% -- the same as that my estimated mortality due to COVID-19. Spain -- with increased testing -- found the COVID-19 mortality to be hovering around 0.2-0.3% now that the virus is affecting younger members of the population.

Italy Lockdown
March 9 - 4 May
Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_lockdown_in_Italy#:~:text=On%201%20April%2C%20Minister%20of,will%20be%20allowed%20to%20open.


France Lockdown
March 17 - 11 May
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_France

Holocaust Deaths — 6 000 000
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust

World War II deaths — 75 000 000

In spite of events like the Holocaust or WWII, people have proven to be resilient in the past. After the bombing in Hiroshima, the trams were immediately repaired and they started running again just 3 days later. Transport did help the survivors rebuild their lives. Now, the primary measure is to limit people's ability to travel. Even with tests and masks available everywhere we see borders closing and as the fall approaches the European Union seems to disappear yet again.