Sir, – Michael McDowell sets out his views on the responsibility to ensure the social and economic wellbeing of the people ("We urgently need real debate on easing lockdown", Opinion & Analysis, April 22nd).
I agree with him when he states that the strategy to ease total lockdown and to restore economic space cannot be exclusively dictated by public health considerations or public health experts.
However, it could also be argued that the decision to ease total lockdown should not be exclusively dictated by politicians, otherwise we run the risk that we might rely on Covid-19 simply miraculously disappearing!
Let’s have debate, but the awfulness of this virus and the really tragic loss of life mandate that we continue to rely on our medical experts via a collaborate cost-benefit strategy. – Yours, etc,
JR QUIGLEY,
School of Business
& Humanities,
Limerick Institute
of Technology,
Moylish, Limerick.