I think it’s still hard because deaths for almost everything else go down when people aren’t out getting in car crashes, picking the regular flu, etc etc.

Automotive fatalities were actually up substantially in 2020.

Also, locking down everyone (and its economic consequences) probably had / will have an effect on number of suicides (not sure if negative - I can't stand it, I'll kill myself - or positive - I can't stand it but life will be better after covid)

Surprisingly not:

"Widespread assumptions that suicide rates would increase during the pandemic are not supported by the growing amount of evidence coming out of Canadian provinces and other jurisdictions around the world, say experts who study the topic."

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/suicides-alberta-bc-s...

There should still be a difference between open vs close then since they open approach would still have people going out driving and getting the flu.

Not really. Excess deaths certainly are not entirely caused by the virus, so you still need to try to subdivide them somehow, which is once again a ripe opportunity for "gaming" / creative statistics.

But if you assume the main thing special about this year was the virus and strategies aimed at mitigating it, you can still compare overall outcomes between jurisdictions. If tight lockdowns decrease COVID deaths but increase other deaths enough to compensate then they didn’t achieve anything. It would be valuable to know the exact breakdown but you don’t have to.

Right, but my point is that it's hard to separate those things if your idea is just "excess deaths tell us the cost". So if lockdowns slow COVID but increase suicides... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I know it’s easy to be a bit cynical once we take an abstract view.

Please let’s remember it is not a simple lever.

Let’s remember the overflowing ICUs and morgues and the very very limited menu of possible immediate actions - all this amongst unprecedented scrutiny, politicization and division.

We’re human. We’re doing the best we can. Lockdowns do flatten the curve.

People only say that since California is actually under reporting more than Florida.