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@MLevitt_NP2013 , I’d like to draw your attention to @Pandata19’s growing body of work on the COVID-19 epidemic, particularly as it pertains to South Africa. Our first publication quantified the economic cost of lockdown in terms of years of life lost. /1 https://www.pandata.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/PANDA-Research-Report-Quantifying-Years-of-Lost-Life-PDF_.pdf
We alerted President Cyril Ramaphosa to our findings in an open letter and we discussed them in a webinar, that has received much attention, calling lockdown “a humanitarian crisis to dwarf COVID-19”. /2
Then this article motivated that lockdown intensity bears no relationship to the shape of pandemic curves. The Flat Curve Society is wrong! /3 https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/author/john-gear-and-ian-mcgorian/
In “The epidemiologists who missed the boat” we laid out the “Panda Hypothesis” and argued that major inferences of standard SEIR models were being falsified at home and abroad, and that they continued to overstate the severity of the pandemic. /4 https://www.biznews.com/inside-covid-19/2020/05/21/government-covid-19-data-panda
On Thursday, we briefed the Minister of Health, summarizing these concerns and calling upon modelers to ensure that their work aligns with observed phenomena in the real world. /5 https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/health/2288906/actuary-tells-mkhize-the-lockdown-has-achieved-nothing-but-making-the-country-poorer/
Lockdowns in developing nations are a moral outrage. Would you join us in calling for @WHO to reverse its policy recommendations, which trap policymakers & perpetuate the extreme harm lockdowns cause? South Africa is mired in these w/ no realistic chance of attaining any. /6
The data do not support continued lockdowns. What is more concerning is that politicians around the world are touting lockdowns as a cure. This is more harmful than the “flat curve” theory and we call on the @WHO to condemn this perspective. /7 & end.
