[incrudible]

My question would then be, what is the natural life expectancy of a suicide or opiate overdose victim, versus that of a person that would have survived COVID only with medical intervention.

We should be looking at deferral of death, not just death count. Death is certain to everyone and I am reluctant to value everyone’s remaining life expectancy equally, at least as far as the healthcare system is concerned.

[midasuni]

In the U.K. there’s no evidence of any change in suicide rates in 2020 (it’s normally about 6,000 a year). Registration delays means that we don’t know the numbers for 2020, but early indications are not much change (suicide has been increasing though and is at a record high)

A much bigger issue is the lost of QALYs from lockdown but not from deaths, including the socio-economic impacts.

ONS have a more through report than a Sunday morning post from a phone.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/news/statementsandletters/estimatingt...

The people who mainly benefitted from lockdown measures are the over 60s

The people who mainly lost out were the under 35s

The recovery plan needs to address this - including fixing the massive wealth disparity. A generation of property owning shareholders who have retired have seen their wealth and income balloon over the last year (and decade). But it won’t, millennials will be screwed.

[Shaanie]

Life years gained is the measure you're talking about, and that's definitely a good measure to take into consideration.