When the UK finally does a lockdown, it'll be fine for about a week. Then people will gradually start breaking curfew and getting up to no good in the absence of police on the streets. By about week 4, things will be barely holding together.
Now, what if the lockdown doesn't fully work? We might wipe out what little covid-19 exists up until that point, but the moment the lockdown is lifted it would pick up again because we went too early like they have in Seoul.
The chances of a second lockdown holding will be slim.
This is about social management as much as it is about virus management. We definitely have to have a lockdown. But the timing has to be right to flatten the curve's peak, not just it's start.
I've read this theory, and while there are some merits on it, I don't really agree with it. I mean, at the end of the day, you can force the people to stay at home. In fact, with the situation getting worse, people will prefer staying at home. And well, put the lockdown now, you can still limit the spread. When hundreds of thousands are going to get infected (likely by the end of the month, or beginning of April), what will a lockdown achieve?
The peak is likely going to be reached around June, when tens of millions are projected to be infected. What would a lockdown achieve at that stage? Die at home, I guess.
Anyway, the fact that they are starting to do a U-turn 1 day after, it doesn't really inspire confidence, right? But better to realize early that it was fecked up plan on the first place.