[mikem170]

> city wide lockdowns ... If the whole world had adopted this strategy, covid would have been eliminated from the planet entirely.

Did you know that covid can infect many other mammals? Here's a summary of the science on this: [0]

> appears that many if not most mammalian ACE-2 receptors are susceptible

> the virus has gone from humans to the animals and back again to human

> found signs of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 in significant percentages of six urban wildlife species

> found signs of the pathogen infecting 17 percent of New York City sewer rats tested

> Exposure could also occur following interactions with pets such as cats and dogs

Does your belief that city wide lockdowns could be used to eliminate covid take the above into account? Wouldn't covid continue to spread in other mammals and reinfect humans again?

I don't know that any experts ever said that lockdowns could eliminate covid. From where did you get such an idea?

[0] https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/how-so-ma...

[DiogenesKynikos]

It's not a "belief." It's a fact that was repeated in many cities - and countries - in the real world.

China completely eliminated CoVID-19 from its population in early 2020, and a bunch of other countries did the same.

[mikem170]

The post I replied to said that if the world had adopted city wide lockdowns covid "would have been eliminated from the planet entirely". I objected that this doesn't account for covid in animal populations. Your reply mentioning China in 2020 doesn't address that objection.

Are you saying that you agree with the original poster, that city wide lockdowns could have eliminated covid from entire planet?

Even if every person in the world were isolated for weeks, so that covid no longer existed in the human population, many animal species would still carry covid, like rats [0] and pets like cats and dogs [1], and humans would become reinfected again.

Unless perhaps we destroy all those animals? And deer, and minks, and bats, and perhaps a few dozen other species [2]. Bats carry hundreds of different coronavirises and spillovers happen all the time [3]. There's evidence that Omicron evolved in mice then jumped back into humans [4]. It doesn't seem possible to eliminate covid from all those animals, does it?

That's why city wide lockdowns could never -eliminate- covid from the planet, as the original poster stated. They could only temporarily suppress covid in human populations. Like what happened in countries that did impose lockdowns. Temporary.

Here's what the scientists say:

> The coronavirus’ ability to infect so many different animals, and to spread within some of those populations, is worrying news: It means there’s virtually no chance the world will ever be rid of this particularly destructive coronavirus, scientists said. [5]

I assume that some people don't want to face the fact that diseases spread between animals and people and there's nothing we can do about it, and that scares them. Some people get so afraid they would do anything, even the impractical, to believe they retain some measure of control. They might not want to face facts that conflict with their fears. Not everyone thinks this way.

[0] https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/how-so-ma...

[1] https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/e...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_animals_that_can_get_S...

[3] https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/02/20/8077428...

[4] https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/covid-19-did-omicr...

[5] https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2023-06-09/coronavirus...