Even introverts can miss going outside or seeing their family.
A counterfactual: how many people would be affected if their spouse/parent died without the lockdown? These tragedies are unfolding in many countries, and by this misfortune we'll be able to see, in retrospect, the impact of government interventions vs outcomes in a pandemic.
Groceries restricted number of simultaneous customers, but I could go anytime and as many times as I wished. Restaurants were open for takeout. Parks were open, and capacity was not enforced. Transit was operational. I could get in my car and drive wherever, Uber was running, etc. I’m fairly certain flights were running through this. So people were socializing indoors with friends&family obviously.
Many singles in their 20s I knew went back home to mom&dad, especially if they lived alone.
No curfew. In fact the only curfew we had was a few days during BLM rallies.
[1] https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/suicides-in-vict...
And parts of europe had more of a lockdown than the US and the population fatality rate is worse. I wonder if covid just doesn't care about lockdowns; the countries that haven't gotten hit badly are 1) an island. 2) an isolated continent. 3) an island 4) a country that sits on a peninsula that has a hugely militarized impermeable border. and 5) a group of islands. Even within the US, the state that has the lowest per capita covid rate... Is an island. Even at the micro level, the city in the bay area that is one of the least affected... Is an island.
On the other hand the UK has a higher CFR and a higher per population mortality than the US, so...
Lockdowns seemed to work in my country early in the pandemic. But in my country many covid measures are reliant on goodwill and voluntary compliance, so if morale drops (as you'd expect with extended lockdown), you expect lockdown effectiveness to drop as well.
It’s clear to me that keeping us out of offices and trains stopped the spread. Unfortunately it had been in the city for 2+ months prior and then ravaged the elderly & medical&front line workers who were out there dealing with it while we got to WFH.
Close, especially indoor contact, without masks, in cooler dry weather appears to be the recipe for disaster here.. ‘ We are seeing it play out in Wave 2 (or 3?) here as people have all gotten very sloppy, even if they are WFH.
From March-October in my social/family circle I knew 0 people with COVID. We were all at home, and people got scared straight pretty quick. Come summer things opened and cases dropped..
From early November to Christmas I knew 30+ people with COVID. Where did they get it? Kids came home from college with it. They went to bars indoors for hours. They dined indoors at restaurants.
B.1.1.7 variant. Coming (already in) the US.
Japan and South Korea had relatively big late December/early January waves. Not US-big, but enough that I wouldn't call it "under control."
China is controlling it, but with another round of strict lockdowns.
Taiwan is doing well. So is Singapore. I'm sure their policies are part of the reason, but I suspect the climate helps, too.
Let's not forget that there are a lot of people who don't live with families or in couple. For them (I am in this case too), most of social interactions are with colleagues during the day and friends in evenings or weekends. Both of these options are at minimum severely hindered.
I can’t get over the techbro straw man of the “lockdown” I’ve seen thrown around a lot. First, compared to most of Asia that actually got this virus under control, we have never really had much of a true lockdown here. Second, it’s not the lockdown, its the pandemic. In most areas economic activity dropped off well before any lockdowns and has remained subdued regardless of lockdown duration as long as the virus remains active.
That is - the economic activity drop is more correlated with level of virus outbreak than with any government orders.
In NYC, everyone I know got sent home a week or more before any city/state lockdowns started.
The only time offices were mandated to be closed in NYC was about 8 weeks when we had refrigerated trucks parked outside hospitals acting as mobile morgues, and the National Guard picking up 100s of bodies per day of those who died at home.
For the most part companies have kept people WFH because they can get close to 100% productivity with close to 0% absences due to disease & death.
The mental health angle of more time spent at home, I still think is a wash. For every extrovert craving lording over a conference room of coworkers, there’s an introvert enjoying reduction in forced social interactions. Lots of people actually like their family & enjoy spending more time with them.