[edit: This article has now been overtaken by The facts. The clickbait headline was meant to attract attention – you try everything in your desperation to bring the truth to light. The report I ask for in this article is now available. Unfortunately indeed with the feared outcome. When I wrote this, I still hoped that my fears would not come true.]
Not a nice headline. After all, that would be exactly the opposite result.
It has not been investigated whether it is true what is written in the headline. Then maybe I shouldn't write it down like that. But if it hasn't been investigated, I'm not allowed to make policy on it, am I? Whether it is this headline or an opposite? That is what is happening now. That's where the economy is breaking down, and we're standing by and watching.
The net health-related result of the lockdown must be easy to estimate by a skilled macroeconomist, especially in consultation with, for example, a social geographer or controller at a healthcare institution or insurance company. You should not consult doctors about this because they have other priorities, as they are obliged to do so. (That's exactly where things go wrong with the care-oriented RIVM. These are policy questions, not medical problems.)
By 'health-related result' I mean: not expressed in currency but in lives, well-being, QALYs or whatever standard the experts want to calculate with. Money should be converted into units of well-being and not the other way around, as often happens. This then leads to the argument that lives cannot be expressed in money. The availability of money, on the other hand, can be expressed as social welfare.
Prognosing over 1 year, 2 years and 5 years is interesting. Longer makes no sense anyway because then 80% of the group you save today will still have died. A period of undermortality will already partly evaporate the gains immediately after the excess mortality peak. So within five years, the lockdown profit will evaporate anyway and you will be back where you were. You have then only replaced the 'misery of earlier death' with the 'misery of later death + the misery of the lockdown'. And then there are new 80+ people to worry about.
My feeling is that even in 1 year it will be difficult to get a positive result from it, let alone in 2 years. Which Macroeconomist and/or Social Geographer sets himself up?
