Lifting the Lockdowns

In this episode of New Ideal Live, Ben Bayer and Onkar Ghate discuss the lifting of the lockdowns and whether they were justified in the first place.

Among the topics covered:

The current state of the pandemic and recent policy decisions;
The criticisms of decisions to lift the lockdowns;
The critics’ mistaken view of the role of government in a pandemic;
The absence of evidence for claims about the efficacy of lockdowns in stopping the spread of disease;
Why hospital capacity preservation justifies lockdowns only by evading the ability of the free market to produce capacity;
Why state governments that have lifted lockdowns are not without guilt;
How paternalistic government encourages personal irresponsibility;
The way forward: legally defining government’s proper role;
The level of evidence that justifies a “track, test, isolate” government policy.

Mentioned in the discussion were Onkar Ghate’s essay “A Pro-Freedom Approach to Infectious Disease” and Ben Bayer’s articles “Unjust Mask Mandates Distract from Real Pandemic Priorities” and “A Pro-Freedom, Pro-Science Alternative to Lockdowns.”

This podcast was recorded on March 17, 2021. Listen to the discussion below. Listen and subscribe from your mobile device on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify or Stitcher. Watch archived podcasts here.