In the nearly three and a half months since California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency March 4, state and county officials have imposed severe lockdowns throughout the state in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Newsom’s declaration gave essentially unlimited powers to health officers, at both the state level and the county level, to control the virus. Those unprecedented public health powers have been used for the first time in American history to require Californians to stay at home and to completely shut down schools and businesses.

Those orders have had devastating economic and social consequences throughout the state.

>>> What’s the best way for America to reopen and return to business? The National Coronavirus Recovery Commission, a project of The Heritage Foundation, assembled America’s top thinkers to figure that out. So far, it has made more than 260 recommendations. Learn more here.

On April 12, Dr. Jeffrey Klausner and I made the case that California’s coronavirus policy must be based on all relevant data and must be publicly justified. On April 23, I made the case that coronavirus policy must consider total mortality as a way of determining its overall health impact. 

The March 18 designation of the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) diagnosis code for COVID-19, U07.1, has led to inconsistencies in assigning the underlying cause for deaths related to COVID-19. However, it has been very difficult to obtain the justification for the lockdowns and recent mortality data. 

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