[thu2111]

Our basic understanding of how infectious diseases spread is completely wrong, otherwise epidemiological models would correctly predict disease and they don't.

I don't really know how to answer your other objections. Their analysis looked at more countries than your list, your "sniff test" isn't a substitute for actual analysis, and the fact that a wide range of news websites summarised the results is to be expected (the actual report appears to have been sent to clients rather than posted on the web).

Here's a different source for you:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8347635/Lockdowns-f...

[matthewdgreen]

I can't even find the actual study itself, and the results Google produces are just a laundry-list of right-wing newspapers with an anti-lockdown agenda. With all that said, the summary of the research appears to be "in the immediate aftermath of a lockdown, when the lockdown hasn't even been fully relaxed yet in many jurisdictions, infection rates are lower than before the lockdown." This isn't exactly big news. (Also, the study is out of date: rates are now spiking in a number of states that have moved out of lockdown.)