The Overton Window of the Lancet Covid-19 Commission

Eventually the window simply doesn't even fit into the house

Harder, faster, longer, stronger. It appears this is all the Lancet Commission want for the next time a pandemic comes along. The authors of the recently released The Lancet Commission on lessons for the future from the COVID-19 pandemic saw failure at all levels, and their only solution is to do the same, but on steroids.

The Lancet report, as Will Jones puts it "makes no sense, but then the pandemic response never has".

Perhaps its incoherence is rooted in its reliance on the "emergence paradigm". As Kuhn put it, a paradigm is based on "shared preconceptions, made prior to – and conditioning – the collection of evidence. These preconceptions embody both hidden assumptions and quasi-metaphysical elements".

The emergence paradigm in question assumes that a virus consists of a single sequence of genetic material and all its descendants, traced back in unbroken lines to the point of emergence.

Once this shared preconception become paradigmatic, then all search for evidence is based on it. Evidence that cannot be explained by the paradigm is ignored. Quasi metaphysical elements, such as a belief in instantaneous contagion of whole regions as a result of a return to the discredited "miasma" paradigm (in the form of airborne transmission), is used instead of attempting to provide explanations. It has been described as "Those who did not see the wisdom and truth of the metaphysics are decried as not embracing the faith in time for their own salvation, and that of humanity".

Lancet is a private business so perhaps this report is not surprising. The first line of the executive summary says it all: 17.2 million dead, which is roughly total excess mortality, so it discounts virtually all global lockdown deaths, which we conservatively know are in the millions. It also falls into the standard trap of using deaths and not life-years lost, even though it quotes Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), the home of life-years lost prior to 2020.

If this is another attempt to move the Overton window towards their side of the house they are going too far. Eventually the window simply doesn't even fit into the house, so those on the inside looking out don't notice its existence, and those on the outside looking in just see a gaping, empty space beyond it.