They have used up trust.
Not only has the academia/media lost much of its credibility on social distancing/lockdown it has collaterally diminished its authority on climate emergency, the Rohingya genocide and all the other 'alerts' it has been issuing. The true will be doubted like the false.
The idea that the people on TV inflated or exaggerated the pandemic fears to justify a lockdown to 'fundamentally change America' must seem monstrous to those who modest jobs and small businesses were lost, but like a spouse walking in on flagrante delicto what else to think?
"Honey I can explain the lockdown. It's not what it looks like!"
Having said that we ought to get a grip on ourselves. Science exists even if the science explainers are baloney. The truth lives despite liars. To paraphrase Kurt Godel 'religion is good though preachers are bad'. We just have to look harder that's all.
