Today on THE NARRATIVE we talk to author of a new book, The Price of Panic: How the Tyranny of Experts Turned a Pandemic into a Catastrophe. Dr Jay Richards, along with biologist Douglas Axe and statistician William Briggs made a comprehensive assessment of the worst panic-induced disaster in history and concluded that the human cost of the emergency response to COVID-19 far outweigh the benefits.
For the first time in history, the world shut itself down—by choice—all for fear of a virus, COVID-19. Government mandated closure of schools and tens of thousands of small businesses, cancelled Churches services and many other restrictions were imposed overnight. Dr Richards explains how the authors took a deep dive into the crucial questions to consider :
What will be the total cost in lives, dollars, and livelihoods of this response from governments, relying on advice from Science?
What role have national and global health organizations such as WHO played in this?
To whom are they accountable?
What evidence do they have for sounding the alarm?
How did science bureaucrats, relying on murky data and speculative computer models, gain the power to shut down the global economy?
How did politicians, who know nothing of the science, decide whom to trust?
Relentlessly focused on what we know and don’t know about the coronavirus, the authors reveal what real experts can contribute when a pandemic strikes; what we need to know; what and how it happened, and how to keep it from ever happening again.
Dr Jay Richards is the author of many books including the New York Times bestsellers Infiltrated (2013) and Indivisible (2012). He is also the author of Money, Greed, and God, winner of a 2010 Templeton Enterprise Award.
Dr Richards is a Research Assistant Professor in the Busch School of Business at The Catholic University of America and a Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute. Dr Richards’ articles and essays have been published in The Harvard Business Review, Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, Washington Post, Forbes and a wide variety of other publications. His topics range from culture, economics, and public policy to natural science, technology, and the environment. He is also creator and executive producer of several documentaries and is an experienced lecturer and public speaker, appearing on several hundred radio and television programs, including Larry King Live (CNN), Huckabee, Dayside, Fox and Friends, Studio B with Shepard Smith (Fox News), Glenn Beck TV and many others. In January 2008, his debate with the late Christopher Hitchens at Stanford University was broadcast live to several hundred North American churches.
His doctorate in philosophy and theology is from Princeton Theological Seminary. He also has an M.Div. (Master of Divinity), a Th.M. (Master of Theology), and a B.A. with majors in Political Science and Religion.