and that is the fundamental legitimacy of the kinds of measures which government used and many classical liberal commentators today use that argument to justify their support for lockdowns. i think lockdown was most justifiable when the vaccines appeared and, indeed, i made sure we put sirjeremy farrar in the front of sceptical mps at that time, so that the best possible case could be made to them by the government s best advocate of that idea but the point was lockdown now, reduce the case numbers, get the vaccines into arms, we really will save large numbers of life that was the best argument they ever had. but if in a sense, to put the argument on its head, who really thinks that it is desirable to prevent businesses operating? that it s desirable to prevent people visiting their family in care homes? that it s desirable to prevent you sitting on a park bench or going for a walk with a coffee? or, indeed, leaving your house for exercise more than once ina day? i really don t thi
behaviour against the law? well, i suppose because we are in search of simplicity, i think that characterisation is broadly correct but nothing is, of course, simple. the harm principle entitles the state to restrain people s behaviour to protect others, and that is the fundamental legitimacy of the kinds of measures which government used and many classical liberal commentators today use that argument to justify their support for lockdowns. i think lockdown was most justifiable when the vaccines appeared and, indeed, i made sure we put sirjeremy farrar in the front of sceptical mps at that time, so that the best possible case could be made to them by the government s best advocate of that idea but the point was lockdown now, reduce the case numbers, get the vaccines into arms, we really will save large numbers of life that was the best argument they ever had. but if in a sense, to put the argument on its head, who really thinks that it is desirable to prevent businesses operating?
suggest that the state should not have been instructing people in the way that it was, that you are happy people took their own precautions but you don t think the government should instruct them, let alone find their behaviour against the law? well, i suppose because we are in search of simplicity, i think that characterisation is broadly correct but nothing is, of course, simple. the harm principle entitles the state to restrain people s behaviour to protect others, and that is the fundamental legitimacy of the kinds of measures which government used. many classical liberal commentators today use that argument to justify their support for lockdowns. i think lockdown was most justifiable when the vaccines appeared, and indeed i made sure we put sirjeremy farrar in the front of sceptical mps at that time so that the best possible case could be made to them by the government s best advocate of that idea but the point was lockdown now, reduce the case numbers, get the vaccines into arms,
took their own precautions but you don t think the government should instruct them, let alone find their behaviour against the law? well, i suppose because we are in search of simplicity, i think that characterisation is broadly correct but nothing is, of course, simple. the harm principle entitles the state to restrain people s behaviour to protect others, and that is the fundamental legitimacy of the kinds of measures which government used. many classical liberal commentators today use that argument to justify their support for lockdown. i think lockdown was most justifiable when the vaccines appeared, and indeed i made sure we put sirjeremy farrar in the front of sceptical mps at that time so that the best possible case could be made to them by the government s best advocate of that idea but the point was lockdown now, reduce the case numbers, get the vaccine into arms, we really will save large numbers of life. that was the best argument they ever had. but who really thinks that it
in the uk, sirjeremy farrar, who runs the wellcome trust, the biomedical research charity. he s a former member of sage, he s been pretty vocal and critical of the government in the past and in fact, at one point threatened to resign from sage because the government wasn t acting fast enough, in his view. he s just been on the radio saying it is reasonable for ministers to wait 2a hours or 48 hours to look at the data, particularly the data on hospitalisation rates in london, which has become the omicron epicentre. so i think ministers will be relieved that something last night or this morning that might have looked like indecision is now getting the thumbs up from a scientist and that actually not doing something was a decision rather than indecision. a former member of the government s scientific but sirjeremy farrar said new controls might be needed before christmas if alarming new data emerged. if transmission continues to rise, it is now one in 50, one in 60 people infected