I think what a lot of lockdown sceptics don’t realise is how little was known about Covid at the beginning. It is closely related to SARS and MERS, which have far higher mortality rates but, fortunately, are far less contagious.
What virologists were terrified of was that it would mutate into a more serious disease. Most viruses mutate to be more contagious but less serious, but it is not always that way.
Initial estimates of mortality rate were around 3% based on the first wave in Italy. Later that was significantly revised down to about 1.2%, but that is still about 3x seasonal flu.
The reality is that epidemiologists who model how viruses spread have to map the expected case loads needing hospitalisation and ICU facilities on to the resources that we have (not nearly enough).
They then guesstimate the r number based on various interventions and decide which ones are needed. It is hard science needing a lot of expertise and computing power.
Of course, the success of some interventions depends on behaviour. Clearly if you close schools and shops, you won’t catch Covid in a school or shop! But, in more communitarian countries, if you politely ask people to minimise mixing, people will do it. Unfortunately, here, as you can see from many threads, many people prioritise their own pleasure and don’t really care about others. They have no empathy for doctors and nurses or middle aged teachers going into classes of contagious children.
The idea that this was the deep state/ government doing some experiment on controlling the population was always batshit crazy and proved so as every single measure was reversed. But, still, some claim lockdown was unnecessary despite hospital statistics proving otherwise. I have not met (or read) a single virologist or epidemiologist who doesn’t believe lockdown was necessary.