www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2020/04/62572/ (Article)
theweek.com/articles/908873/public-health-case-against-coronavirus-lockdowns (more discussion about the first article)
The title of the author's essay ("Lockdowns Don't Work") sounds provocative, but Stone is defining "lockdown" very narrowly, as measures that literally shut people in their homes and allow them to leave only for short times and for a very narrow range of reasons, often closing places like parks as well.
His point (and his statistical analysis looks very good to me) is that the lighter measures (closing schools, shutting down long-distance travel, banning large gatherings, and centralized quarantine, plus things like mask-wearing), appear to be what drives the reduction in infections and deaths, and that other measures added on top of this (literally confining people to their homes, closing parks or trying to stop people from going in them etc.) are not making any particular difference.
Wuhan is often cited as a model for severe lockdown. Yet analysis of the timing of the changes in Wuhan's numbers of infections and deaths suggests that it was actually the instigation of centralized quarantine procedures (removing infected people from their homes and putting them in a centralized quarantine facility to reduce the risk to the rest of the family), rather than the lockdown itself, that made the biggest difference to the numbers. The lockdown did make a difference too--but not as much as the centralized quarantine. Most importantly, the centralized quarantine was carried out in partnership with the lockdown, meaning that there were far fewer households where healthy people were basically stuck inside with an infected person, being exposed to huge doses of the virus.
In the west, we are imposing lockdowns without attempting to carry out centralized quarantine. Meaning that we are basically trapping healthy people with sick people in small, confined spaces and having them breathe air that is heavy with viral load, all day and all night.
Or, as the second article puts it, if viral load is indeed important with this disease "we would want to avoid creating situations where people are cooped up together in enclosed spaces. We might look askance at the idea that keeping everyone packed in their homes is the optimal strategy. And we might worry less about folks having a picnic in the park."
I keep seeing people on here saying "But WHYYYY! are the the cases and deaths not falling? We have been locked down for weeks?" Well, there is a large part of your answer--people are most likely infecting family members, and a lot of those family members will be getting severely ill due to the amount of virus they are being exposed to.
I think Stone's analysis is a good one, and it could help us to point a way towards coming out of lockdown. School closures, travel restrictions and so on are all really important things for flattening the curve, and will have to go on for a while longer.
But perhaps we need to spend a bit less time shaming people on social media for going out for two walks a day, sitting on a bench to eat a sandwich, or talking to their neighbor through a window or at a distance of several meters.... and a bit more time demanding to know why our government has failed to do things like test people, provide proper centralized quarantine for those who need it and are willing to go, and getting people to wear masks.