Did So-Called ‘Johns Hopkins Study’ Really Show Lockdowns Were Ineffective Against Covid-19?

Have you seen the so-called “Johns Hopkins study” that’s been making the social media and Bill Maher rounds lately? Some folks have been asserting that this “Johns Hopkins study” somehow showed that Covid-19 “lockdowns” have been essentially useless. If you haven’t seen what they’ve been referring to, could it possibly be because there’s been so-called “a full-on media blackout” of this so-called “Johns Hopkins study,” as an article for Fox News has claimed ? Or maybe, just maybe, this “Johns Hopkins study” didn’t receive much press because it wasn’t exactly what some people have been claiming that it is.

First things first, it’s not really appropriate to call this a “Johns Hopkins study,” which might suggest that Johns Hopkins University has somehow commissioned or endorsed the study. Nevertheless, some people and social media accounts have been pushing the whole Johns Hopkins name:

Yeah, the University itself didn’t write the paper, because buildings can’t type on laptops without crushing them. Heck, the paper even stated that, “views expressed in each working paper are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the institutions that the authors are affiliated with.” Therefore, if folks really want to mention Johns Hopkins University, they should instead be referring to this working paper as being “from a professor at Johns Hopkins University,” as Maher did in this past week’s episode of his HBO show Real Time with Bill Maher:

As you can see, Maher dropped the Johns Hopkins name without even mentioning the professor’s name: Steve H. Hanke, PhD, a Professor of Applied Economics at Johns Hopkins University and a Senior Fellow at The Cato Institute, an American libertarian think tank. Maher also didn’t specify that the other two authors weren’t from Johns Hopkins University: Jonas Herby, MS, whom the working paper described as a special advisor at Center for Political Studies in Copenhagen, Denmark, and Lars Jonung, PhD, who is a professor emeritus in economics at Lund University, Sweden. Moreover, Maher didn’t specify that the three authors were economists rather than medical, epidemiology, or public health experts. It’s not clear how much economists would understand the complexities and subtleties of medicine and public health. After all, if you go to the emergency room for an illness or injury, you probably wouldn’t want someone who’s just an economist treating you.

Note that Herby, Jonung, and Hanke used the term “working paper” in the paper. This is an important distinction. A working paper is not the same as a peer-reviewed study published in a reputable scientific journal just like how a YouTube video of you getting pelted with sausages is not the same as a full-length Hollywood movie. Basically, anyone who has access to the Internet, a laptop, and opposable thumbs, can post a “working paper” on a website, which is what these three authors basically did. So take anything said by a working paper with a closet-full of Ugg boots full of salt.

This working paper made some fairly bold claims. For example, it concluded that “lockdowns have had little to no public health effects, they have imposed enormous economic and social costs where they have been adopted. In consequence, lockdown policies are ill-founded and should be rejected as a pandemic policy instrument.” By the way, what did the authors consider lockdowns? Well, according to the working paper, “lockdowns are defined as the imposition of at least one compulsory, non-pharmaceutical intervention (NPI).”

Holy changing definitions, Batman. By Herby, Jonung, and Hanke’s definition, even face mask requirements would be considered a “lockdown,” because face masks are a NPI. Yet, how many times have your heard when wearing a mask, “how’s that lockdown of your face going?” Sure, a face mask may prevent your nose from wandering away from your face and partake in a night of debauchery, before returning to your face in the morning. But other than that, face mask requirements don’t really restrict your ability to move away from home. This is quite different from the Dictionary.com definition which describes a “lockdown” as “a security measure taken during an emergency to prevent people from leaving or entering a building or other location.” So unless you are wearing a ridiculously enormous face mask or one with BDSM chains, wearing a face mask shouldn’t prevent you from leaving or entering most buildings.

OK, changing definitions aside, did this working paper really provide enough evidence to support its bold claims? In a word, no. In two words, heck no. The authors claimed that they performed a systematic review and meta-analysis. That should mean that they should have considered and included all published peer-reviewed studies relevant to the topic at hand. Yet, this working paper did not include or even acknowledge many such studies that have shown the benefits of NPI’s such as face mask wearing and social distancing without explaining why such studies were excluded.

Of the 34 “studies” included in the review, 12 of them were actually working papers. In fact, 14 of the “studies” were actually from economists with only one being from epidemiologist. This is odd since most of the key NPI research studies have been conducted by epidemiologists, medical researchers, and other public health experts. To qualify as a meta-analysis, a study needs to fulfill established criteria, which includes demonstrating that you’ve included all of the studies that have been published. Without providing clear evidence that you have done so, instead of “A Literature Review and Meta-Analysis of the Effects of Lockdowns on Covid-19 Mortality,” would a better title have been “Stuff that We Selected to Support Our Point of View?”

Claiming that NPIs “have had little to no public health effects” simply goes against what’s been observed and documented throughout this Covid-19 pandemic. Just look at the rather stark differences among how countries have fared during this pandemic in terms of Covid-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths. Countries that have followed the existing scientific evidence such as New Zealand, Taiwan, and South Korea have had much fewer deaths and hospitalizations than countries that have frequently veered away from the science such as the U.S., the U.K., and Brazil.

So back to the claims of Joseph A. Wulfsohn writing for Fox News that “There has been a full-on media blackout of the new study outlining the ineffectiveness of lockdowns to prevent Covid deaths.” In his article, he asserted that “the Johns Hopkins study received no mention on any of the five liberal networks this week. According to Grabien transcripts, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS and NBC all ignored the anti-lockdown findings after having spent much of the pandemic shaming red states with minimal restrictions and events deemed by critics as ‘superspreaders.’”

Uh, there were plenty of non-political and non-partisan reasons to not cover this working paper. Obviously, media outlets can’t cover everything that anyone happens to post on a website. Otherwise, you’d be getting daily updates on what’s been posted on the FartShare website. It’s not clear what a “full-on media blackout” even means or how exactly it would work? Would someone somehow send a memo to all journalists everywhere telling them not to cover something? Would there be a secret sign, emoji, or set of semaphors?

This whole “Johns Hopkins study” is like déjà vu all over again. Back in April 2021, I covered for Forbes how some people were pushing a so-called “Stanford study” that wasn’t exactly from Stanford and wasn’t even really a study. So be wary whenever people emphasize the name of any particular academic institution associated with a study rather than focusing on the study itself and who specifically performed it. Universities consist of many different professors and other academics who have varying levels of expertise and experience and the academic freedom to pursue whatever research they choose. Just because someone is from a given university doesn’t necessarily mean that the person knows what he or she is talking about. Again, instead, evaluate the person’s background and what specifically he or she is saying. A “Herby, Jonung, and Hanke working paper” may not sound the same as a “Johns Hopkins study,” but would be a whole lot more accurate description.