WHO urges world leaders to stop using lockdowns as primary virus control method

[rasbridge]

The World Health Organisation is calling for world leaders to stop locking down their countries and economies.

 

Dr. David Nabarro from the WHO appealed to world leaders yesterday, telling them to stop “using lockdowns as your primary control method” of the coronavirus.

He also claimed that the only thing lockdowns achieved was poverty – with no mention of the potential lives saved.

“Lockdowns just have one consequence that you must never ever belittle, and that is making poor people an awful lot poorer,” he said.

 

Dr. David Nabarro from the WHO appealed to world leaders yesterday, telling them to stop “using lockdowns as your primary control method”.Source:Twitter

“We in the World Health Organisation do not advocate lockdowns as the primary means of control of this virus,” Dr Nabarro told The Spectator.

“The only time we believe a lockdown is justified is to buy you time to reorganise, regroup, rebalance your resources, protect your health workers who are exhausted, but by and large, we’d rather not do it.”

Dr Nabarro’s main criticism of lockdowns involved the global impact, explaining how poorer economies that had been indirectly affected.

 

“Just look at what’s happened to the tourism industry in the Caribbean, for example, or in the Pacific because people aren’t taking their holidays,” he said.

“Look what’s happened to smallholder farmers all over the world. … Look what’s happening to poverty levels. It seems that we may well have a doubling of world poverty by next year. We may well have at least a doubling of child malnutrition.”

Melbourne’s lockdown has been hailed as one of the strictest and longest in the world. In Spain’s lockdown in March, people weren’t allowed to leave the house unless it was to walk their pet. In China, authorities welded doors shut to stop people from leaving their homes. The WHO thinks these steps were largely unnecessary.

Instead, Dr Nabarro is advocating for a new approach to containing the virus.

“And so, we really do appeal to all world leaders: stop using lockdown as your primary control method. Develop better systems for doing it. Work together and learn from each other.”

 

The WHO’s criticism of lockdowns involved the global impact, explaining how poorer economies that had been indirectly affected. Picture: Christopher Black/AFPSource:AFP

His message is timely. In a world first, a number of health experts from all over the world came together calling for an end to coronavirus lockdowns earlier this week.

They created a petition, called the Great Barrington Declaration, which said that lockdowns were doing “irreparable damage.”

“As infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists, we have grave concerns about the damaging physical and mental health impacts of the prevailing COVID-19 policies, and recommend an approach we call Focused Protection,” read the petition.

“Current lockdown policies are producing devastating effects on short and long-term public health.”

The petition has had 12,000 signatures so far.

It was authored by Sunetra Gupta of the University of Oxford, Jay Bhattacharya of Stanford University, and Martin Kulldorff of Harvard University.

When asked about the petition, Dr Nabarro had only good things to say. “Really important point by Professor Gupta,” he said.

 

Source:  https://www.news.com.au/world/coronavirus/global/coronavirus-who-backflips-on-virus-stance-by-condemning-lockdowns/news-story/f2188f2aebff1b7b291b297731c3da74

[mclaren85]

No one should listen them. They are the only reason to cause virus spread so rapidly.

[BimBamSmash]

It is always easy to criticize without offering a better alternative.

 

Doc might want to appeal to China to make its solution public, instead. Surely they have something that has kept a country that large in a stable state.

[7even]

WHO only good at stopping zombie infection in World War Z. Else... meh. 

[NorthEastKnight]

From my understanding the WHO has become more so politically motivated because it needs the funding, so now what can you believe to be absolutely true advice. 

[tennis]

There is a dictionary definition for good health.  Here is one: the state of being vigorous and free from bodily or mental disease.  According to a WHO doctor (Nabarro) the world today is hardly in good health and he explained why, in the OP.  It is worth repeating some of the key points raised in the OP.  These serve as a basis for a full conversation on the subject of Covid-19 lock downs.  It seems there is a consensus building, that so far represents the views of 12,000 infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists, that lock downs are creating more harm than any benefits, to the world at-large.  It's hard to disagree with the concerns they raise.  From the OP:

 

The World Health Organisation is calling for world leaders to stop locking down their countries and economies.  ...Dr. David Nabarro from the WHO appealed to world leaders yesterday, telling them to stop “using lockdowns as your primary control method” of the coronavirus.....

His message is timely. ....In a world first, a number of health experts from all over the world came together calling for an end to coronavirus lockdowns earlier this week.

 

They created a petition, called the Great Barrington Declaration, which said that lockdowns were doing “irreparable damage.”  

“As infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists, we have grave concerns about the damaging physical and mental health impacts of the prevailing COVID-19 policies, and recommend an approach we call Focused Protection,” read the petition.

“Current lockdown policies are producing devastating effects on short and long-term public health.”

 

The petition has had 12,000 signatures so far.