A commentary in the British medical journal the Lancet warned: “Suicide is likely to become a more pressing concern as the pandemic spreads and has longer-term effects on the general population, the economy, and vulnerable groups.” Signed by numerous doctors engaged in mental health research, the article noted: “Loss of employment and financial stressors are well-recognised risk factors for suicide.”32
Was Washington paying attention? National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Anthony Fauci acknowledges that he doesn’t study the societal trade-offs involved in his virus recommendations. In Senate testimony in May he made it clear that the economic consequences of shutdowns, which he had previously called “inconvenient,” were not his responsibility.33 Fauci was testifying shortly after the U.S. unemployment rate had hit a post–World War II high.34
The government health expert is clear on the fact that Americans should not rely on him to conduct cost-benefit analysis of the policies he promotes. But even within the realm of public health, he’s not making the case that continuing to restrict activities will make Americans healthier overall but only that it will, in his opinion, reduce Covid-19 deaths.
Another medical doctor, Senator Bill Cassidy (R-La.), asked at the May hearing about calculating the negative impact of school shutdowns on the health of children compared to the possible benefits of avoiding Covid-19. Dr. Fauci said, “I don’t have a good explanation, or solution to the problem of what happens when you close schools, and it triggers a cascade of events that could have some harmful circumstances.”35
How can a public health official endorse the radical step of closing schools without at least presenting an argument that it would have a net benefit for public health?
To be clear, children have been paying the largest share of the cost of shutdowns, but they’re not the only ones. Appearing on Mornings with Maria in May, Hologic CEO Steve MacMillan said that in April and early May “we have seen a dramatic drop-off in women going for their mammograms” and pegged the recent decline in U.S. mammogram visits at an astounding 80 to 90 percent. MacMillan warned of potential long-term consequences and said, “The whole key to cancer screening is finding things early.”36
“With most of the nation still on lockdown, many people are missing regular screenings and checkups with their doctors,” Jeff LeBenger and Mike Meyer wrote in the Wall Street Journal in May. “Some may be experiencing early symptoms of illness, yet aren’t seeking treatment. The effects of a six-week delay are surmountable in most cases, but a six-month delay would lead to much sicker patients and dramatic increases in death rates for major illnesses such as cancer. The number of people who die as a result of these delays could end up rivaling or exceeding deaths due to Covid-19.”
The doctors warned: “Much is being written about the potential of Covid-19 to return aggressively in the fall, assuming it recedes during the summer. But there may be a major aftershock that could throw the health system into further crisis: a flood of patients with other illnesses who are much sicker than they would be had they not delayed visits to their doctors for fear of coronavirus exposure.”37
The panicked reaction of politicians and the press encouraged patients to overreact. Dr. Harlan Krumholz is a professor of medicine at Yale and director of the Center for Outcomes Research and Evaluation, Yale–New Haven Hospital. During the shutdown spring he wrote in the New York Times about a bizarre decline in the demand for medical services: “What is striking is that many of the emergencies have disappeared. Heart attack and stroke teams, always poised to rush in and save lives, are mostly idle. This is not just at my hospital. My fellow cardiologists have shared with me that their cardiology consultations have shrunk, except those related to Covid-19.…
“And this is not a phenomenon specific to the United States,” Dr. Krumholz continued. “Investigators from Spain reported a 40 percent reduction in emergency procedures for heart attacks during the last week of March compared with the period just before the pandemic hit.”38
Ohio physician Kristofer Sandlund reported, “I am seeing a reluctance amongst my most vulnerable patients to seek medical care of any sort. Patients with stroke symptoms are not calling the EMT’s and delays are costly.”39
The shutdowns also put the health system under extreme financial pressure. Politicians issued draconian orders to prevent the virus from overwhelming hospitals. But according to an April report in the Wall Street Journal, “Hospitals have been cutting the elective surgical procedures and routine care that normally pay the bills in order to free up resources.”40
The nonmedical advice from economist Scott Grannis is to “pray for a speedy reopening of the economy.” Mr. Grannis predicts that the shutdown “will prove to be the most expensive self-inflicted injury in the history of mankind.”41
9
Is Bidenomics Turning Out to Be Bernienomics?
Some Democrats must be wondering why their party asked them to show up and vote in this year’s primaries and caucuses. Since last winter Democratic voters nationwide have made it abundantly clear that they do not want a candidate promoting massive structural change in American government and society. But the party leadership seems determined to give them one anyway.
Beginning in South Carolina in late February and continuing through the final months of the nomination contest, Democrats soundly rejected the radical option: Vermont’s socialist senator Bernie Sanders. Exit polling data published by the Washington Post in March showed that, across the Super Tuesday states, most Democratic voters consider themselves conservative, moderate, or somewhat liberal, while a minority call themselves “very liberal.”1 Most of these Democratic primary voters don’t regard income inequality as the most important issue facing the country, and
