To Tell the Truth is a Human Events News’ press analysis series. These stories will focus on “news” being reported by either The New York Times, The Washington Post, ABC News, NBC News, or CBS News. Despite 24-hour cable broadcasts, and an untold number of internet sources, these established, mainstream platforms continue to influence the majority of American citizens and their political opinions.
The “news” generated by these press is better regarded as “opinion” crafted in a way designed to discourage skepticism and critical thought on the part of the audience. To Tell the Truth will be Human Events News’ periodic effort to help address this bias, and restore the skepticism necessary on the part of all Americans to maintain a free society.
On Jan. 15, Newsweek reported on a groundbreaking study published ten days prior in the European Journal of Clinical Investigation. The study, conducted by Stanford researchers, found that mandatory lockdowns in response to COVID-19 “did not provide significantly more benefits to slowing the spread of the disease than other voluntary measures.”
Five days after Newsweek’s report, news of the study remains absent from the websites of major American news outlets, including the New York Times, The Washington Post, NBC, ABC, and CBS.
“The study compared cases in England, France, Germany, Iran, Italy, Netherlands, Spain and the U.S. – all countries that implemented mandatory lockdown orders and business closures – to South Korea and Sweden, which instituted less severe, voluntary responses. It aimed to analyze the effect that less restrictive or more restrictive measures had on changing individual behavior and curbing the transmission of the virus,” Newsweek reports.
“We do not question the role of all public health interventions, or of coordinated communications about the epidemic, but we fail to find an additional benefit of stay-at-home orders and business closures,” wrote the researchers.
The named outlets have continued to cover coronavirus-related news and even research studies, especially those having to do with the severity of the virus and the importance of a vaccine. The New York Times has covered several studies in the days since the Stanford research was released, including the following:
From Human Events, here.