This report argues that the best available domestic and international evidence suggests that lockdowns don’t work. They impose significant social, cultural, humanitarian, and economic costs while at best being of debatable efficacy in managing the propagation of COVID-19 over the long term. At worst, lockdowns are counterproductive because the negative health consequences they induce can come to outweigh the direct health benefits of reducing the propagation of COVID-19.

The original public policy objective of state and federal governments which formed the basis of the social distancing measures first introduced in March was based on medical capacity, and was enunciated as “flattening the curve” or “shifting the curve”.

This report recommends that governments cease pursuing elimination and return to a strategy based on “medical capacity”.