I suggest,whatever the differing views on "the science", what has been lacking in this crisis is any sophistication regarding different human behaviours - the message for a 17 year old who believes they will live for ever is different to that for a 70 year old who knows that they will not.
I appreciate with 60,000,000 people the message needed to be somewhat simple and crude but "one size fits all" was never equally applicable to a sheep farmer in Cumbria and the youth of an inner city area.
When people cannot personally identify with the message, they ignore it.