Michigan’s updated pandemic playbook heavy on lockdowns, light on proof

Michigan's current pandemic plan cites evidence that does not appear to support its lockdown measures, according to documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request.

The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services updated its pandemic emergency plan in 2024, several years after the last of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s lockdowns came to an end. Yet the plan is short on lessons learned from the lockdown period, and its main federal source does not support the contents of the Michigan plan.

When Michigan Capitol Confidential asked the department to provide the evidence supporting the 2024 plan, it pointed to a set of guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The guidelines do not endorse shutdowns and social distancing.

The state’s pandemic plan references a 2017 CDC report to justify its strategies. Michael Van Beek, director of research at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, said the two are not compatible, calling the state’s reference misleading.

“The department either has an idiosyncratic interpretation of the 2017 CDC report that it refuses to articulate or is trying to pull a fast one,” Van Beek said. “There are no alternatives.”

The CDC explains its recommendations in table 10 under “Recommended nonpharmaceutical interventions for influenza pandemics, by setting and pandemic severity.”

CDC guidance advises preemptive measures to slow transmission before a virus starts spreading, Van Beek said, but it does not support social distancing once a virus is circulating in the population.

Even under the CDC guidelines, quarantines and isolation strategies are voluntary and do not require legal enforcement, he said.

Despite the state health department’s repeated reference to these guidelines, Van Beek said, there is little empirical evidence to support many of the interventions the state endorses. The 2017 CDC report repeats several times that there is little to no good evidence for any particular social distancing policy, he said.

Dr. Anthony Fauci was the chief medical advisor to President Joe Biden. He said, during a House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic hearing in 2024, that the six-foot social distancing measure was likely not based on scientific data, according to The New York Post.

In the state’s plan, however, social distancing and lockdowns could be the only tools available to slow transmission of a pandemic virus.

Lockdowns during the COVID pandemic have had lasting effects, none of which are mentioned in the state plan. Some businesses were permanently shuttered, and children still have not yet academically recovered. Suicide rates increased.

The state health department did not respond to CapCon’s emailed request for comment.