public health emergency

In March 2020, the global COVID-19 pandemic became a critical public health emergency. The surge of new cases in the U.S. began to overwhelm health care systems and stretch them to the brink of collapse. States began to implement highly effective, but very restrictive mass quarantine policies known as “lockdowns” in an effort to flatten the epidemiological curve of COVID-19 cases. Describe the ethical challenges these state policies pose in terms of balancing individual rights and public health. Do you believe that mandatory state lockdown policies were justified? Why or why not?