“We find no evidence that lockdowns, school closures, border closures, and limiting gatherings have had a noticeable effect on COVID-19 mortality,” researchers wrote in a new analysis for Johns Hopkins University. That doesn’t mean lockdowns had no effect. “They have contributed to reducing economic activity, raising unemployment, reducing schooling, causing political unrest, contributing to domestic violence, and undermining liberal democracy,” the report notes. Given these “enormous economic and social costs,” the researchers conclude, “a standard benefit-cost calculation leads to a strong conclusion: lockdowns should be rejected out of hand as a pandemic policy instrument.”

We’ll pause a moment while you process the fact that authoritarian government leaders might not have done what’s best for us, but instead exploited the coronavirus pandemic to gain power.

Why did so much of the U.S. and Europe, where this study was focused, lock down in the first place? Primarily because of that early 2020 infamous projection model from Imperial College London that forecast millions of deaths in the U.S. if such draconian measures weren’t implemented.

Of course, we knew from the get-go that this model was deeply flawed and that the COVID cure may be worse than the disease. Indeed, much of 2020 was then spent assessing and recovering from the damage lockdowns caused. For example, while the study doesn’t use the word “despair,” deaths of despair skyrocketed during the pandemic, as did deaths from other causes because lockdowns prevented treatment.

Economist Stephen Moore accounts for this and other detrimental effects in his latest recap: “Now here we are, two years from the start of COVID-19, closing in on 1 million dead and $5 trillion more in debt. Millions of children have suffered, perhaps irreparably, from a loss of schooling (some of which still goes on in some districts). There are some 50,000 to 100,000 deaths of despair caused by the lockdowns. And the virus is still out there, though thankfully in retreat.”

The authoritarian class wouldn’t let go of the idea that they needed to control your life to save it. And way too many people are still going along with that. But Moore’s last sentence is key: “And the virus is still out there.”

Yes, we’re going to have to learn to live with COVID, much like we do the annual flu. Indeed, most Americans are ready to do just this.

A new Monmouth poll asked whether “it’s time we accept that Covid is here to stay, and we just need to get on with our lives.” Predictably, 89% of Republicans said “Yes,” as did 71% of independents. What’s appalling is that just 47% of Democrats are ready to move on. The rest of them are like shadow-fearing groundhogs hunkering down for a longer winter.

“An NBC News poll on the schools found the same kind of partisan splits,” writes Rich Lowry. “According to the survey, 65 percent of people were most worried about kids falling behind academically, and only 30 percent were most worried about the spread of Covid. Again, Republicans and independents were strongly on one side — 87 percent and 66 percent were most worried about lost learning — and Democrats divided, with 43 percent worried about kids losing academic ground.”

That Karen you encounter at the supermarket who yells at you to put on a mask? She’s almost certainly a triple-vaccinated Joe Biden voter. Heck, many of the people still voluntarily wearing masks fit that profile, whether they scream at you or not. Most Americans realize that, after two years, this virus and its mutations are probably here to stay. Take reasonable precautions and otherwise get on with life.

It is the “get your laws off my body Democrats” who won’t let the rest of us do that, and that polling is exactly why Biden and Democrat governors keep parts of the nation in various levels of lockdown while pushing fear 24/7. Yet the midterms are coming, and Mark Alexander predicts a big Biden pivot on COVID, declaring we can begin returning to normal because he “shut the virus down” as promised.

Update: Power Line’s Paul Mirengoff points out some issues with the lockdown study. His critique is well worth a read and pondering.