Since it& #39;s now a right-wing talking point that a weak economy may kill more people than the virus, question: have we actually seen that in past slumps? No. 1/ https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/13/us/politics/peter-navarro-coronavirus.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/1...

The Great Recession didn& #39;t cause a spike in mortality (OECD data) 2/

Mortality actually fell during the Great Depression! 3/ https://www.pnas.org/content/106/41/17290">https://www.pnas.org/content/1...

But what about "deaths of despair"? Those do indeed reflect loss of economic opportunity — but over the long term, and associated with rising inequality and loss of social status. There is no reason to believe that reopening the economy in the face of pandemic will save lives 4/