Why did Sweden decide to act differently?

[tontie]

Sweden is an outlier, any ideas as why they decided to do things differently? protect the economy or because they think this is the best long term strategy?

Only if that means they won't get that care though Porcupine which probably means the UK needs to lockdown but if Sweden's healthcare provision can cope, maybe they can afford for everyone to get it at once and by doing so they get back to normal sooner?

There's a lot of guesswork and I'm very glad these decisions aren't down to me!

I was thinking the other day though with this being related to the common cold what if it’s patterns are much the same? Do you get varying severity of colds, e.g. I had a horrendous cold in October went on for a month, eventually ended up as sinusitis but it’s the worst one I have had for years then once it had cleared I got another milder cold about a month later, what is this follows the same
Kind of patterns in that there will be varying severity even if there is no immunity and you can keep getting it? It all really pickles my head

There's a lot of guesswork and I'm very glad these decisions aren't down to me!

Who on earth would want these positions having to make decisions re lives with the added pressure of trial by media 🤯

I thought Sweden were facing a lot of criticism, as are we, or we were at least.

Yes, from what I have read - lots of the lockdown measures are in place but they have been recommending them to the Swedes and they are complying. Not their culture to make it a law.

However, they are getting a bit panicky now as it is in care homes there

This interview explains Sweden’s approach in some detail. Seems very sensible

unherd.com/thepost/coming-up-epidemiologist-prof-johan-giesecke-shares-lessons-from-sweden/

Also, we have this expectation that there WILL be a vaccination. We have never had one for the common cold, HIV or other Corona viruses. This is a bloody tricky bug to nail down. Just because they are advancing to human trials at the moment, doesn’t mean that this thing is going to work. (They have also skipped ahead of several stages required by the FDA to get to this stage, btw...) I am dubious.

There may not be vaccination but there's likely to be some effective treatment developed. Anti virals have come a long way in recent years.

Agreed justilou but perhaps necessity will be the mother of invention. Oh and virtually unlimited funding.!

I thought Sweden were facing a lot of criticism, as are we, or we were at least

They are. My friend who lives in Sweden is horrified. But on MN for some weird reason they think herd immunity is a good idea for Sweden yet a terrible idea for us. No idea why since Stockholm is very populated so the idea that Sweden "hardly has any people" isnt true.

Also, forgot to say that more than 2,000 scientific experts signed an open letter to the Swedish government calling for stronger action, and some fear that a surge in coronavirus deaths is imminent. So not everyone thinks its a great idea!

Although there are some concerns that the countries who put in strict lockdowns and early are going to be badly affected when they relax them with the secondary waves of infection that are expected. Some population antibody testing in the US is indicating that 50-80 times more people have had it then expected from the testing of symptomatic people in area that had been done. There are calls to do a population mass test in a UK medium sized city to see what the spread has been like.

I was just thinking about that MimiLaRue!

Sweden certainly has the highest number of deaths per 1m population in Scandinavia, but I think there is a long, long way to go. Countries will have to come out of lockdown - maybe then they'll follow the Swedes - protect the vulnerable, maintain some level of social distancing, work from home if you can etc., and deal with the next "waves".

Many of the cases seem to be in their ethnic minorities living close together - it seems they tried leafleting those areas to help them

It will be interesting how it plays out.

Their deaths are increasing rapidly. One report:

www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/sweden-coronavirus-deaths-lockdown-social-distancing-denmark-finland-norway-a9470771.html

@TheCountessatHotelCortez the "common cold" isn't one virus though and isn't even one type of virus.

You have raised the the problem that if someone has Covid-19, ends up with damaged lungs or hasn't fully recovered then gets another type of virus, that second virus could kill them.

@Orangeblossom78 how is leafleting a family of 6 living in a one bedroom flat, or a mother and 2 children living in a hostel with only one shared kitchen between 8 other families going to help?

At the moment any attempt to compare outcomes is pretty pointless because we don't know what the final outcomes will be. Will there be second/third waves? Will an effective treatment or vaccine be available sooner rather than later?
There are lots of demographic factors that need to be taken into account in order to get genuinely comparable figures, average age of the population, population densities, rates of people living with underlying conditions.
There appears to be a disparity in BAME deaths but no one is certain as to why this is - it could be socioeconomic, cultural or genetic. All of these factors need to be balanced alongside the measures taken in different countries.
At the moment there are too many variables and too much that is just unknown to make meaningful comparisons. How is lockdown affecting non CV-19 deaths (e.g. suspension of cancer treatment), what will the long term economic impact of lock down/ not locking down be and what impact will that have on health/deaths for years to come.
I believe that unlike the annual flu death figures which are adjusted to allow for "expected deaths" CV-19 deaths are the raw data so will appear much worse than the flu figures. Are there countries that appear to have good figures that have are applying the expected deaths formula to figure or reported in other different ways that mean a death in country A will be logged as CV-19 but in country B it's recorded as a heart attack?
It will take years for the full impact to play out, even if the virus disappeared tomorrow because the impact on other aspects of health such as delayed diagnosis or treatment of cancer, heart conditions, strokes etc will take years to filter through.

I’d recommend watching the interview on the link that @hamstersarse posted (great name BTW ).

Sweden’s approach is very similar to our few days of social distancing before our ‘lockdown’. Our government then made a u-turn following the Imperial College paper that estimated 500k would die without a lockdown. The professor is v.critical of this paper and the subsequent decision, as the paper was unpublished, not peer reviewed and based on ‘dubious’ modelling. He also believes around 50% of people in a lot of countries have already had the disease.

I do believe in some of the things he’s saying, but not all - for example, I think the lockdown was necessary to buy us time to increase ICU capacity, get different treatment trials underway, and make a little bit of progress with the vaccine. It was also necessary to help reduce the panic that had been caused by various stories in the press.

I don’t think any country will know the full extent of how far the disease has spread without large-scale antibody testing. And I think every country will need to weigh up the estimated deaths from COVID-19 vs. the estimated deaths from a lengthy recession/depression caused by the prolonged lockdown, including NHS funding (less taxes, less money for healthcare, more deaths)

I'm just sharing the approach as I read, (leaflets) not saying it is correct LittleLittle. I suppose they were trying to advise on social distancing

Please don’t think I agree with anything though... I am standing inside my house frightened and ignorant, reading everything and becoming more confused and frightened. I am not sharing any opinions of my own at all!!!

I think density isn't actually that significant an issue, excluding absolutely packed, shanty or slum type conditions where the challenges are greater IF (and it's a big IF...) if the people practice social distancing correctly. S Korea, which has done so well so far, has twice the density of the UK. Taiwan's is three times that of the UK. Strategic distancing, isolating, tracing.

Even in countries which have a low population density generally, such as NZ, the people do still live in large clusters. A third of all NZers live in Auckland, for example - there's just a lot on uninhabited space in the country too.

Both Japan & China have had new outbreaks
japan had no link with tourism for this second outbreak (it was said it started on the Northern Island of Hokkaido I think - nearest Korea? - but I also seem to remember that there was a strong fishing community?)
China new out break is centred on a border town with the USSR (cant remember new initials!) I think but a lot of re-blame is on people coming into the country. Its early days for this outbreak.

thing is we all trade & ships & trains (a lot of new trains go form China through N India & Pakistan & westward & whether their only carrying goods or not at this moment, there will still be people on board & there will be some degree of mixing & infection is a chain)
The newest comment by WHO is that even if someone carries the anitbodies doesn't mean they wont get it again or be able to still pass it on. Think ebola, in that case (& yes I know this is passed differently) the persons body was still producing virus for ages after they apparently were clear. People were actually getting it by having sex with their partners as the virus was still in their body for up to 6 months after - that Scottish nurse (sorry cant remember her name) was taken back into hospital later. I would state again that this virus is not the same & we don't know its progress this was & it is not transmitted the same way its basically respiratory not blood like ebola.

The other thing that is an important vector is densely packed public transport system. I think this is a common system in NY & London & in Italy they have an excellent train network.
Decreasing tube & train journeys into London & other cities may be long term as well as working from home

@Orangeblossom78 certain people are being to quick to jump on poor people which include a lot of BAME people in this country.

BBC London - not watched any of the other local news broadcasters properly but won't be surprised if they have picked up on it - have shown repeatedly from the first week of lockdown that it is impossible for some poor families to isolate and socially distance due to their living conditions.

Leafleting in various languages does SFA to deal with poor housing conditions.

Interestingly the people I personally know who have or are flaunting the conditions are various Christians who go to those new churches and have no difficulties in understanding English.