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(UK) "Zero Covid" is an authoritarian fantasy

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https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/02/15...n-fantasy/

Even as Covid becomes a manageable threat, some are demanding lockdown forever.

EXCERPTS: There’s plenty to be optimistic about at the moment. Covid cases are falling across all four nations of the UK. [...] At the weekend, health secretary Matt Hancock said that thanks to vaccines and treatments we should soon be able to live with Covid as we do the flu. Implicit in Hancock’s comments was the rejection of a ‘Zero Covid’ strategy, in which we would attempt to eliminate Covid-19 in the UK.

The idea of Zero Covid was given a significant boost by Britain’s disastrous second wave. Advocates of the strategy never seemed to be off the television [...] On one level, there’s an appealing simplicity to the idea. Who could possibly be in favour of death and disease? At the same time, Zero Covid campaigners have dishonestly presented it as an alternative to the endless lockdowns, masks and social distancing that have made life so miserable.

[...] in reality, Zero Covid really does mean endless lockdowns. In Australia, which has drawn praise for its Zero Covid approach, lockdowns of whole cities and states have been triggered by even minor outbreaks. ... In November, the entire state of South Australia was put into lockdown after a man lied about collecting a pizza. Who’d call that an end to endless lockdowns?

[...] it’s clear that authoritarian China is also pursuing an aggressive Zero Covid strategy. ... When 100 infections were detected in Tonghua, a city of two million people, all residents were banned from leaving their homes. City officials sealed people’s doors. Many were trapped in their apartments without supplies, leading to food and medicine shortages.

Even in places that aren’t in lockdown, the track and trace system can be extremely invasive – and not just in terms of privacy. [...] Besides, it’s one thing to declare Zero Covid as an aim, it’s quite another to achieve it.

[...] What is most striking is that the arrival of the vaccines doesn’t seem to have changed how Zero Covid campaigners consider the balance of harms between catching Covid and the suppression measures. Despite the vaccine rollout, Independent SAGE has called for ‘restrictions for the foreseeable future’. ‘Vaccines are not a silver bullet’, it says in a paper addressed to the government. Indie SAGE wants social distancing and mask-wearing ‘particularly among those who have been vaccinated’.

The vaccine programme presents a real problem for Zero Covid advocates, because it essentially means they want to suppress a disease that will no longer cause any significant harm. [...] Let’s hope the gradual return of our freedoms inoculates us against the authoritarian fantasy of Zero Covid.... (MORE - details)
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