A chara, – Michael McDowell was almost a lone voice in your pages in questioning Ireland’s Covid response. With the benefit of hindsight and all the available evidence on excess mortality across Europe, his instinct at the time was correct (“We must never repeat the colossal damage we inflicted on ourselves during Covid-19″, Opinion, April 29th).
More broadly, the pandemic revealed something uncomfortable about the Irish psyche. Faced with some uncertainty and fear at the outset, the majority simply deferred to authority and dismissed any dissenting views.
Some well-recognised cognitive patterns and biases were clearly at play. McDowell states we must never repeat our mistakes but the same shortcomings in the Irish psyche will simply reassert themselves whenever the next crisis comes along. – Yours, etc,
REAMONN O’LUAN,
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Churchtown,
Dublin 14.
