Doctors Call for Reopening, Say Lockdown Creating 'Public Health Crisis'
California emergency room doctors urge governments to lift lockdown measures
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A group of emergency room doctors in California is calling on governments to lift coronavirus lockdowns, arguing that the measures are creating a "public health crisis."
CORRECTION: The doctors' claims have since been disputed. We have updated the article to reflect the new information and removed their claims, which have been proven false. Please see below for further updates.
During a Wednesday press conference, ER doctors Dan Erickson and Artin Massihi of Accelerated Urgent Care told reporters that nationwide lockdown policies are having the reverse impact.
The group insists that shutting down the country is not an appropriate reaction to what current data shows about COVID-19, but the measures are instead causing measurable public health issues.
The doctors argue that the lockdowns are causing spikes in domestic violence, sexual abuse, depression.
They say fear of infection is also being spread to non-coronavirus related would-be patients, causing them to skip out on vital health care.
UPDATE: According to additional information from Health Feedback, the doctors wrongly used the number of COVID-19 positive cases in ER patients to extrapolate the prevalence rate of COVID-19 in the population. This caused sampling bias that overestimates the number of infections in the general population and consequently underestimates the COVID-19 mortality rate. Their claim that sheltering in place would lead to a weaker immune system due to less contact with microorganisms is also inaccurate, as even home environments are already seeded with trillions of microbes.
We have removed all claims made by the doctors to ensure no incorrect comments were included in this article.
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