{"id":115356,"date":"2020-07-02T13:54:44","date_gmt":"2020-07-02T11:54:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/?p=115356"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:24:59","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:24:59","slug":"dutch-corona-policy-causes-more-suffering-than-it-prevents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2020\/07\/02\/dutch-corona-policy-causes-more-suffering-than-it-prevents\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Dutch corona policy causes more suffering than it prevents’"},"content":{"rendered":"

The measures taken against the coronavirus may be more deadly than the virus itself. That is what psychologist Micha\u00e9la Schippers and clinical ethicist Erwin Kompanje say, who together wrote a hard-hitting article on the effects of the coronavirus policy. “The very people we wanted to protect have been weakened by this policy.”<\/p>\n

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Micha\u00e9la Schippers is a psychologist and Professor of Behaviour & Performance Management at the Rotterdam School of Management. She researches goal setting, group behaviour and personal happiness. Erwin Kompanje is a philosopher and clinical ethicist at Erasmus MC, which functioned as the epicentre of the Dutch corona strategy in recent months. Together they wrote the article For the Greater Good? The Devastating Ripple Effects of the Covid-19 Crisis<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\t<\/div>\n

How did a clinical ethicist and a psychologist from the Faculty of Business Administration come together to write a paper on the measures being taken to combat Covid-19?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Erwin Kompanje replies: \u201cIt was her idea \u2013 she should explain.\u201d<\/p>\n

Micha\u00e9la Schippers says: \u201cI was worried about the measures that were being taken. When people go into lockdown, that\u2019s intense, even if it only lasts two weeks. But it soon became apparent that it would last longer. People were terrified; vulnerable people had hardly any access to care or psychological support, and my mother was locked up in a nursing home. I thought: This is going to have huge negative consequences across all sorts of areas \u2013 social, psychological, and economic, not just public health. But around me there was scarcely any interest in criticism. People waved it away. I contacted Erwin after I read a story on his blog in which he also expressed his concerns.\u201d<\/p>\n

EK: \u201cYou set up a policy to achieve a goal. Here the goal was to reduce the influx of patients into the healthcare system to prevent it from becoming overburdened, causing even more people to die. That seemed to work at first, and the curve flattened out a bit. But every remedy has side effects, even now. As an ethicist, it\u2019s my job to constantly weigh up the good and bad outcomes of a measure that has been introduced.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\t

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