[sadness3]

I recently read three peer-reviewed papers comparing the morbidity of COVID-19 vs the flu, and what it came out to was that COVID-19 is roughly 6x more lethal per modern case.

I'm afraid I can't be bothered finding the links to those papers for you, because it was matter of curiosity. You have to take into account how easily COVID-19 spreads as well, and you don't need the finer details to see the bigger picture.

Let's do a litmus test on whether COVID-19 deaths are a problem compared to the flu. Mass graves dug for flu victims in the last 20 years: zero. Mass graves dug for COVID-19 victims in the last 2 years: a bunch.

[throwawaysea]

COVID-19 IFR overall is something like 0.5% across all populations. While the typical seasonal flu is 0.1%, both are relatively harmless in the grand scheme of things. This becomes more clear if you look at ages under 50 - the IFR for them is astonishingly low, to the point that societal restrictions are effectively risk containment for the elderly or unhealthy (like the obese) at the expense of the young and healthy. I think that makes the discussion around the tradeoffs more difficult and nuanced. I’m not saying that any one approach is definitely right or wrong, but that there are legitimate perspectives and lines of reasoning to support a relatively wide set of approaches.