Covid: The devastating toll of the pandemic on children - BBC News
I find this hard to read. Those who favour lockdown, on what I think is a flawed premise that it saves lives, have surely to shoulder responsibility for what’s happening as a consequence. https://www.bbc.com/news/health-55863841

It may be possible to ameliorate to an extent some of these consequential harms, but most are I think intrinsic to lockdown. Here’s where I think we’ll eventually come out. I’ve been criticised for what others say is an illogical position, that lockdowns don’t save lives. That...

...is what all the evidence I can find indicates. The counter argument is this is a disease passed between people, thus lockdown, which reduces social contacts, must save lives. I don’t agree. I do agree that reducing social contacts must reduce spreading to a degree. But as...

...many, important areas for transmission remain open (hospitals, care homes, food production, supply chain & supermarkets, some workplaces, some public transport) to what degree is lockdown effective in reducing transmission? I haven’t seen the evidence that shows it’s a...

...strong effect, an effect large enough that we can look each other in the eye & say that the pain & impact of lockdown is worth it. And here’s the thing I can’t get past. The people who unfortunately die “with or from” Covid19 are, in the main, people close to end of their...

...lives. A not-untypical outline is of a person in their late-70s to their 90s, who already suffered from two or three chronic, serious & life-shortening illnesses. I can envisage such a person, perhaps in a care home, who through care & good luck, avoided infection in the...

...spring. But their lives have become horribly constrained, more than already. The rationale is to save them from illness & deaths from this virus. But even if they avoided the virus in spring, even if they received a vaccine, I just don’t think those actions of society will...

...extend that persons life by much if anything. They’re often finished by this virus because their life is medically already in a precarious, easily worsened situation. A person with this cold, prior description isn’t likely to have their life extended by vaccination, because...

...nothing can do that. It is certainly true that there are some, younger people who are killed by this virus. But again, almost none were not previously carrying significant, chronic, life-shortening illnesses. It’s entirely possible that we’ll have the same finding in the end..

...that vaccination doesn’t much if at all extend their lives. This would be a tragic outcome. I don’t doubt the motives of those who favour lockdown. I would only wish they would return the understanding. I fully accept I’ve completely lost any battle we might have painted...

...this unhelpfully polarised debate to have been. Lockdown has happened & it’s become hugely extended. Those who wanted lockdown have succeeded. So we’ll get the outcomes from this policy decision & no amount of vitriol will alter it. As I’ve said, I think we’ll eventually...

...conclude it didn’t save lives, net of its costs (which include many deaths, brought forward as a result of restrictions on access to medical care). I do think lockdown will be shown to have somewhat delayed some lethal infections (emphasis on the ‘somewhat’ & ‘some’, because..

...at most, these effects must be marginal, or they’d have leapt at us, obvious to all, the first time it was done, and they didn’t). But I don’t think there’ll be a positive payoff. I wish there would be. Because we’ve all paid the price. So congratulations to the winners.