We did outlaw driving without seatbelts. Against strong protests at the time.

We don’t know what happened in the alternate universe where there were no seatbelt laws. Maybe there are people here who died because they stubbornly refused to ever wear a seatbelt because they had taken a public stance against seatbelts and made not wearing a seatbelt into a noble fight against tyranny. Maybe in the other universe they’re still alive because they were able to come around and change their mind without feeling like they lost a fight and were admitting defeat.

But I guess we’ll never know, because if you think something is a good idea what you should do is immediately use the government to coerce everybody into doing it under threat of fines and punishment.

Are you seriously arguing that without seatbelt laws more people would've been saved by seatbelts?

If we count all the lives saved by extra organs donated, maybe?

Have you never heard of the saying “you catch more flies with honey”?

Is the law really the driving force behind why most people wear seatbelts? I don’t think so.

Exactly! We don't outlaw cars.

But we have speed limits, stop signs, seat belt regulations, airbag requirements, crumble zones, crash tests, driver training and testing, significant drunk driving laws, ...

If we had equivalent sensible precautions for COVID as we have for cars, mask mandates and vaccination requirements would be the minimum and carry significant penalties.