Scott Alexander explores various COVID-19 topics including lockdown effectiveness, infection rate variations, transmission risks, prediction markets, and ethical considerations of pandemic response. Longer summary

This post covers various aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic, including lockdown effectiveness, heterogeneity in infection rates across countries, transmission risks, prediction markets, and ethical considerations. Scott discusses cell phone data showing limited impact of official lockdowns, explores reasons for varying infection/mortality rates between countries, and highlights the role of speaking/singing in virus transmission. He also examines coronavirus prediction markets, questions the long-term sustainability of lockdowns, and ponders how to quantify the severity of COVID-19 deaths compared to other causes. The post concludes with numerous short updates and links on coronavirus-related topics. Shorter summary