Commentary One of the many remarkable features of the COVID “new normal” has been the seemingly widespread compliance of doctors with draconian and irrational health mandates. Such mandates have included unprecedented school closures, curfew orders, prohibitions on hugging, magical-thinking restaurant policies, restrictions on outdoor activities, harsh fines for drive-in church services, interdictions on businesses selling items deemed non-essential, and excessive force by police to uphold the orders. We have heard little from doctors even on subjects presumably close to physicians’ hearts, such as the cancellations of non-emergency surgeries, the use of “virtual’” medical consultations, and the yearlong isolation of the elderly in care homes. My mother, in her 90th year and with various health ailments (still, fortunately, living in her own home), has been unable to see her doctor in person, with one brief exception last summer, over the past 14 months. Once-regular visits have been replaced by phone consultations in …