Why are people lying about Covid-19 lockdowns?

As I started up the car, Duncan Garner's voice boomed out. In his shrill 'trying to be one of the boys but failing' shout, he raged about how 'we were all locked down' and 'Jacinda needs to front up!*' over Aotearoa's (he said New Zealand's obviously) Covid-19 response.

My youngest piped up from the back seat, "What is this?" and I knew I was in for a heavy amount of statistics on the death toll around Covid-19. It's his current pet project, researching infectious diseases and containment.

For budding wannabe researchers, our Covid-19 response is fascinating. And the revisionism around Covid-19 is just as captivating.

I have spoken (argued) with people who genuinely believe we were unable to leave the house for over a year. Recently, I had a group of commenters claim I had no idea how traumatising lockdown was because they're from Tāmaki Makaurau and I'm not. They repeatedly stated that the Tāmaki Makaurau lockdown would be another six months on top of the almost year-long national lockdown.

I'm so intrigued by how the level four lockdown of a smidge over a month, and extended to level 3 for one month, (25 March 2020 to 27 May 2020) becomes a year-long lockdown. And less than two months in two separate lockdowns of less than a month in Tāmaki Makaurau becomes six months.

Because while it might have felt that way, the Right Wing Covid-Denier Conspiracy Theorists love to tell us facts aren't feelings.

We did have a second national lockdown in 2021, from 18 August to 1 September, which was extended in Tāmaki Makaurau as stated above. However, that's still a significant gap between lockdowns, and they were not months long.

There are likely many reasons why people seem to have a collective amnesia. We did have restrictions for social gatherings, and we had to 'sign in' to places. But to me, that ain't lockdown. It's a minor inconvenience and no worse than what immunocompromised people experience every day.

I will state my position now and say that the lockdowns cooked me. The Tāmaki Makaurau second lockdown meant my play was cancelled. All momentum was gone from a play that had been sold out and was going really strong. I believe Covid 19 is why it never made it to Australia.

I was working three jobs and raising a family, and it was incredibly stressful.

But - we supported the choices made because staying at home and taking precautions stopped thousands and thousands and thousands of people from dying. We weren't the only ones who supported it. A Newshub–Reid Research poll, conducted from 8 to 16 May 2020, asked whether it was "the right call" to implement the nationwide Level 4 stay-at-home order from March to April. 91.6% responded "yes", 6% "no", and 2.5% "don't know".

A paper published in 2023 in The New Zealand Medical Journal wrote that if New Zealand had the same mortality rate as the United States, around 20,000 more people would have died.

So how did we get here? Why is there this complete rewriting of history? Why is Duncan Garner, a wealthy man who had an extremely comfortable lockdown, losing his mind? Why is David Seymour acting like he'd have made better choices when he can't even get one bill across the line, even with enormous influence on an inept prime minister?

Well, in my view, if you focus on 2020, you won't see what the Government is doing in 2025 - dismantling our health and education system with the aim of privatisation, pushing through bills in urgency, and steamrolling us all with racist anti-Māori legislation.

And they're using simpletons for their bidding because these are people who are easily rarked up. They want to blame the high unemployment rate on lockdowns five years ago rather than the politicians they voted for. They elected this Government in anger against Labour, but found that this Government didn't care about them at all. That must hurt.

But, in talking to others, I think it's not just distraction. My brilliant friend Lamia and I had a chat about this, and she talked about how we're not seeing the impact of Covid-19 being discussed anymore. And that makes it hard to conceptualise what we won then, and have since lost.

"[Covid-19 deaths] around the world were in the news constantly in 2020 and 2021, so at the time, we all supported what New Zealand was doing because we did not want that here. We saw hospitals being overwhelmed in other countries, and we wanted to prevent that in this country, which we did!"

"But now other countries essentially pretend like nothing bad happened during those years, and they got the vaccine, and the virus got weaker, and everything is fine now. They do not address the deaths from Covid-19 or talk about those deaths that are happening in 2025".

"Most people who get Covid-19 now don't necessarily die or have the symptoms that people had in 2020 and 2021, so they retroactively believe Covid-19 now is the same virus as Covid-19 in 2020, which leads to the question: Why did we make such a big deal about it? But this is not the same virus, and we have a highly vaccinated population, particularly in the 65-plus cohort."

"The efficacy of the vaccine has played into some of this. The vaccine provides some protection, but people can still get Covid-19 and still be disabled from it. I think people thought we would lock down and wait for the vaccine and it would be worth it but the vaccine does not provide 100% protection against infection." 

I agree with Lamia too, that we need to reckon with our past experiences with Covid-19 and face the reality of Covid-19 in 2025.

So, what do you do when faced with this push to rewrite history? Is it worth sharing the facts? I think so. Currently, we are not seeing people challenge the misinformation that is out there. We are tired and overwhelmed, so it doesn't seem important to.

But I'd argue it is essential. Covid-19 is still killing people. And there will be another pandemic. And we want our response to be better. We must learn from mistakes and improve. We must remember how we protected so many and ensure we value human life again.

I asked ChadLeft (one of my favourite Instagram follows) to share some graphs with me to help us set the record straight. Over to ChadLeft who is much smarter than me and can break this down for you.

*Jacinda did front up, of course. She's given evidence. But Duncan Garner et al will never let the truth get in the way of a hysterical wank on the radio. And they will always want blood.

THE REAL REASON THEY’RE LYING ABOUT COVID-19 LOCKDOWNS -ChadLeft

New Zealand had one of the best Covid-19 responses in the world. All of the bad-faith arguments about the lockdowns are untrue. Let’s run through them:

Claim: LOCKDOWNS CRASHED THE ECONOMY!1!1!!1!1!!
Truth: Our economy recovered more quickly and strongly than comparable countries.

By the third quarter of 2020, the economy regained its pre-pandemic levels and remained above this level through to the end of 2022. Read more here.

Claim: THE GOVERNMENT RACKED UP MASSIVE DEBT!!!!1!111!!
Truth: We have low debt. Sigh.

The Covid-19 Royal Commission Report stated that the Covid-19 pandemic was "a global event, and its impacts on Aotearoa New Zealand’s economy cannot be separated from global economic conditions that existed when it started or were created by it".

In terms of debt, Treasury officials advised the Government that the benefits of this spending would outweigh the possible costs of debt rising above 50 percent of GDP.

"Treasury considered that the economic supports were proportionate to the health response, given the stringency of the public health measures taken at times during the pandemic."

Claim: EVERYBODY LOST THEIR JOBS!!!1!!11!!
Truth: We had one of the lowest unemployment rates in 40 years.

The unemployment rate fell quickly to 3.2 percent, its lowest level in 40 years (December 2021 quarter). New Zealand’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 5.2 percent in the June 2025 quarter.

Claim: KIDS MISSED TOO MUCH SCHOOL!!!111!!!!
Truth: We had fewer school closures than most comparable countries.

Claim: THE MENTAL HEALTH TOLL WAS TOO HIGH!!!111!!!
Truth: Experts advised that letting Covid-19 rip would be far more damaging to mental health. Suicides actually dropped in the lockdown years.

Claim: THE LOCKDOWNS JUST WENT ON TOO LONG!!!111!!!!
Truth: By being strict early, we spent LESS time with restrictions than comparable countries.

Claim: HUMAN LIVES AREN’T WORTH SAVING (Implied by ACT MP Brooke van Velden).
Truth: Saving 20,000 lives was good actually.

Claim: LOCKDOWNS WERE UNPOPULAR FROM THE START!!!111!!!
Truth: The party that oversaw the initial lockdown was rewarded with the best election result since 1951. We spent Summer 2020 at festivals while the rest of the world had overflowing morgues. Check your camera roll. How did you forget about this so quickly? Wtf?!?

Bonus claim: JACINDA SAID SHE’S THE SINGLE SOURCE OF TRUTH!!!111!!

This out-of-context clip has been used by cookers and opposition leaders alike to paint Jacinda Ardern as some dystopian dictator.

Ardern was responding to social media rumours about changes in Covid-19 alert levels. She explained that if we are going to change levels, we will make an official announcement. We will be your reliable source - not your mate’s uncle’s partner who apparently works for the Government.

She wasn’t saying that she’s the only source of truth for every piece of information. That would be fucking stupid.

So why is a globally lauded response such a target for vitriol and revisionism at home?

I thought it was because we were shielded from the true death toll of the pandemic, but even in countries where millions of people died, there’s still anger toward lockdowns.

Honestly, lockdowns are an easy target to tie people’s grievances to. They were difficult for many. But far more importantly, for the first time in several decades, the pandemic revealed that New Zealanders live in a society.

We were not scattered individuals whose actions had no impact on one another. We were a team of 5 million™. We relied on each other.

We accepted the principle of sacrificing short-term private profit for long-term collective health and wellbeing.

That principle is an existential threat to the political right. This is why the attacks are so relentless.

It is also a principle that Labour does not apply consistently, which is why they’ve struggled to stand behind it and defend their pandemic response from right-wing attacks.

They are politically afraid even to mention the pandemic response, ceding important ground, and jeopardising public health moving forward.

So instead of talking about the fact that people are still dying and being disabled by Covid-19 every day, with no treatments or cures, we’re pretending it no longer exists and trying to hold show trials for politicians.

Instead of addressing the pandemic wealth transfer, our Ponzi scheme housing market, and our inept tax system, we’re getting Herald editorials about the trauma of not being able to go for a haircut.

What a fucking shame.

Here are some worthwhile Covid-19 articles for you from the past week alone:

Big thanks to ChadLeft for sharing this with me. Follow ChadLeft on Instagram.

I think he's absolutely right, and I think it helps to be calling out ridiculous responses to the Covid-19 response because it is part of anti-fascism mahi.

As you know, I'm not a fan of the Labour Party. But I will always hold a soft spot in my heart for Jacinda Ardern because I know I have family and friends who wouldn't be here today if she hadn't made the tough calls that she did.

When my son was hospitalised with Covid-19, a colleague said to me, "Gosh, that's shocking! I didn't know it was that bad". And I thought, surely you knew! Like many people with a loved one with high health needs or a disability, we have told everyone that Covid-19 is particularly dangerous to our people.

It was frustrating to see people drink the convenient Kool-Aid that means they don't feel guilty travelling with Covid-19 or going to mahi with Covid-19 or not masking or staying home when they're sick.

If we hadn't had the time to develop vaccines and deal with earlier, less severe strains of Covid-19, I honestly don't know if my son would have survived. I'm deeply aware that Covid-19 in 2025 is still taking lives. I don't want to minimise that. However, I'm incredibly grateful that we had access to anti-virals when he contracted Covid -19 and a better understanding of the virus.

Had he not survived, we as a family we wouldn't have survived. So yes, I'm going to speak up, and I hope you will too.

We have lost good people to Covid-19 and we would have lost more had we not followed the science. And the revisionism of the past is part of a distraction game by the right, and also, it's a way to keep us divided.

Let's not fall for that. We didn't then. We shouldn't now.