Introduction

It was constantly claimed that politicians followed science during the Covid-19 pandemic. This suggests that they acted as public-interested individuals who took expert advice to protect public health and to promote the so-called "common good.” Another possible explanation of the pandemic decision-making is that they ignored science and simply acted in order to maximize their personal utility. This is in line with public choice theory which holds that politicians act as self-interested persons. On closer inspection, it is showed that the latter is the case and that the pandemic policy responses were at odds with science, served the interests of politicians and bureaucrats who were at the helm during that decision-making process while inflicting serious damage to the society by and large. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Public Choice Theory: An Explanation of the Pandemic Policy Responses

Public choice theory suggests that the pandemic policy responses were in fact the result of politicians' and bureaucrats' ambition to pursue their own interest. The main target of politicians during the Covid-19 pandemic was the one that politicians typically aim at, i.e., to maximize votes. Lockdowns, mass vaccination, and vaccine passports are largely explained by the vote maximizing premise. Bureaucrats such as scientists who work for the government but who do not appear as candidates in the elections also engaged in utility maximizing during the Covid-19 pandemic by pursuing their own goals which include, among others, increased popularity and willingness to establish their reputation. A budget maximizing analysis is used to illustrate how an ever-increasing budget satisfies nearly all groups involved in the pandemic, i.e., politicians, bureaucrats, and voters. Findings from polls and election results verify the public choice analysis. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Viral Mitigation: Weak Theoretical Underpinnings

Mitigation measures included primarily lockdowns and masks and, later in the pandemic, mass vaccination. All of them were supposed to eradicate the disease or at least to "flatten the curve.” To stress the need for disease eradication and/or the need for reduced transmission rates, three postulates were put forward by the proponents of the pandemic policy responses. First, it was claimed that the virus poses a high death risk to all age-groups, and so we need policies that will be able to offer protection to all people. This is the first postulate, which I would like to call the "equal vulnerability thesis.” Second, the claim that there is no pre-existing immunity and hence all people are equally susceptible to the virus, which is the "equal susceptibility thesis.” The third postulate is that the coronavirus can be transmitted not only by symptomatic but also by asymptomatic people. This is the "equal infectivity thesis.” These three premises were mistaken, and the pandemic policies, i.e., lockdowns, masks, and mass vaccination, failed to achieve their declared goals, i.e., they did not eradicate the disease and they did not impact on transmission rates. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Epilogue

The evidence is overwhelming in favor of the public choice explanation of the pandemic decision-making while simultaneously refuting all the public-interest claims thereof. The theoretical presuppositions upon which public choice theory relies are more robust than the ones of public-interest explanation, and this is vindicated once again when the two theories are applied to the Covid-19 pandemic. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

The World Stampeded: From Mass Hysteria to Prolonged Mass Hysteria

During the Covid-19 pandemic, people were constantly under the delusion of an exaggerated threat. When Sars-Cov-2 started circulating, the public was inundated with warnings (primarily due to media coverage) that serious disease and death are around the corner, and mass hysteria was ignited. The irrational fear that everybody faces high likelihood of death was taken as gospel, and this belief led to the development of emergent norms in the society which in turn helped spread the hysteria across the population. While episodes of mass hysteria in the past suggest that mass hysteria wanes sooner rather than later, in the Covid-19 crisis, governmental interventions, mainly lockdowns, exacerbated the effect by leading to a novel kind of mass hysteria, what I would like to call as prolonged mass hysteria. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.