[jfman]

Even the leading Conservative party candidates for leadership admit - up to two decades - of economic failure. I hardly consider it controversial for me to say so.

I add you to those I challenge to outline where I advocate lockdown (or even where the sum of what I suggest adds up to it). It's just not there - it's a wilful misinterpretation of my posts.

Do I think there's intermediate steps that, from time to time, might be proportionate? That's probably in there - depending on circumstances of course. If not taking action there's an acknowledgement that there's consequences - economically - to that too. Again, I'm not being controversial there. Sick days add up at the most basic level, and that has impact on the provision of public services, essential services provided by the private sector, and others. In particular those sectors already decimated by the end of freedom of movement.

Pierre hypothesised that restrictions wouldn't work - that's the only point where I've directly addressed the subject. Framed proportionately around what the state could do, and that rational actors within it wouldn't be as willing as he suggests to risk themselves in the face of a more severe variant. The reality is the vast majority of human interaction is entirely incidental in a way that restrictions could enforce even if groups of individuals flouted the rules (which Pierre indeed admits he has been since the start - so that's not new).