Should anybody be blamed and punished for 2.2 million COVID-related deaths in the world?

An editorial in an influential British medical journal says politicians who didn't respond aggressively enough to control the coronavirus pandemic should be held responsible for those deaths, which the editorial says could be classified as "social murder."

"Politicians must be held to account by legal and electoral means, indeed by any national and international constitutional means necessary," wrote Kamran Abbasi, MD, the executive editor of BMJ.

Abbasi writes that the phrase "social murder" was coined by philosopher Friedrich Engels to describe the conditions created by privileged classes in 19th century England that "inevitably led to premature and ‘unnatural' death among the poorest classes."

Today, the phrase may describe "the lack of political attention to social determinants and inequities that exacerbate the pandemic," he writes.

"When politicians and experts say that they are willing to allow tens of thousands of premature deaths for the sake of population immunity or in the hope of propping up the economy, is that not premeditated and reckless indifference to human life?"

Among the politicians mentioned in the editorial are former U.S. President Donald Trump, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi — all leaders of nations with high numbers of deaths.