Unless we make a judgement-call on value how can we balance taking away peoples freedoms over extending other peoples lives?
Consider the following questions:
* Would you accept 70 million people staying inside for a year to extend a single persons life by 10 years?
* Would you accept 500 people staying inside for a year to extend a single persons life by 10 years?
* Would you accept 5,000 people staying inside for a year to extend 10 peoples life by 10 years?
* Would you stay inside for an hour to save another persons life by a year?
* Would you stay inside for a year to save another person life by 1 year?
These are the real questions that we have to answer, and they will absolutely (and unfortunately) need people to face into the question of the value of life.
My personal answer to these questions is (in sequence) No, No, No, Yes, No. A reasonable person could answer completely different - there is no absolute right answer in any of these!
We can pretend that the answer to these questions is impossible - but these are the real decisions that policy makers need to make. How much is someone's freedom worth compared to the life of a stranger?
I agree with that as precisely stated, but one can reasonably make subjective judgements (and indeed our politicians are doing so at the moment).
If we could live on average 6 months longer if we permanently stopped all gatherings, closed all restaurants/bars, and wore masks all the time we were outside our house, I think most people would say “screw that; it’s not worth it!”
It’s a subjective judgement rather than an objective calculation, but it’s still valid.
