Afterword: Quantifying, Mediating and Intervening: The R Number and the Politics of Health in the Twenty-First Century

Abstract

This essay discusses the unassailable power and popularity that numbers have come to assume during the COVID-19 pandemic. Epidemiological statistics have come to play a remarkable and public role, regulating our lives, while shaping and justifying political decisions. This essay traces the emergence of one particular number, the “R” number or reproduction number in multiple and dispersed sites, drawing attention to the bifurcation of demography and epidemiology in its emergence. It examines how and why the R number came to act as a crucial mediating instrument during the pandemic, linking the health and well-being of the population with the health of the economy and supporting arguments both in favour of and against restrictions of various kinds.