In March 2021, a doctor in Brazil named Ricardo Savares published a now-discredited research paper that went viral on social media. It had been a year since the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic forced governments to apply desperate measures collectively known as lockdowns. The findings were quite remarkable on the face of it, says Gideon Mayavid's cats, an epidemiologist at the University of Wollongong, Australia. As he and others would show, the results were wrong because of errors in the paper's choice of statistical methods.
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries introduced strict lockdowns to help prevent spread of the disease. Since then, researchers have been studying the effects of these measures to help inform responses to future crises.
Conclusions suggest that countries that acted swiftly to bring in strict measures did best at preserving lives and their economies, but analysing the competing costs and benefits of lockdowns has been tough, as this work often comes down not to scientific calculations, but value judgements.
This is an audio version of our Feature: What scientists have learnt from COVID lockdowns
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