The unprecedented restraints that Victoria’s Andrews government imposed upon its citizens this week demand a much more substantial answer to the question of what the authorities are trying to achieve.

Medieval city governors exercised their power to lock in their citizens against plagues. But there are serious questions over whether the Victorian government’s poorly planned and executed shutdown of large swaths of business next week, enforced with the modern police state tools of curfews and permits, is the least costly way to correct the failures that led to the state’s outbreak of COVID-19 infections.