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?

Herd immunity isn't a strategy, it's an outcome

If a high proportion of a population, say 80%, is immune to, or vaccinated against, an infectious disease then the disease hopefully will wither away, because it has nowhere left to go. No host.

All epidemics, hopefully, will reach this stage at some point. The lockdown restrictions, light or heavy, attempt to manage when that will be. So all countries know they will reach that herd immunity stage anyway

I don't think there has been a massive difference in what most countries have done. The virus is new and not enough is known about yet.

ATM, unfortunately, it cannot be stopped dead in its tracks. Its a force of nature, like an erupting volcano or earthquake. But what can be done is limit the damage and the best way ATM seems to be to slow it down, flatten the curve, so that the health services are not overwhelmed all at once. Gradual lockdowns, then gradual lifting of lockdowns. Maybe waves of this strategy over the coming months . It's an experiment because it's new

You do what Sweden are doing. They have a death rate as percentage of population lower than ours, and which, crucially is trending down. They expect to achieve herd immunity in a few weeks. The vulnerable are shielded during this period, after which they can leave their homes.

They have not been successful with care homes, but no less so that countries with a hard lockdown. And their 20 somethings behave as normal and their vulnerable will be able to come out as normal in a couple of months, after herd immunity. Whereas here I have no idea when I will next be allowed to visit my dad.

Where did you see that the death rate in Sweden is trending down?

They did it because of the economy. The elderly in care homes are dying like flies. The healthcare is underfunded and they have the lowest number of ICU beds in EU.

They expect to achieve herd immunity in a few weeks. The vulnerable are shielded during this period, after which they can leave their homes.

I have read various reports that suggest care homes in Sweden are having a bad time with CV,
which isn’t really consistent with shielding the vulnerable. If they are expecting to gain herd immunity in a few weeks, they’ll have to “undistance” themselves dramatically.

The idea that Swedes is some kind of panacea where they are happily going about their lives as normal, gaining herd immunity whilst they do so with very little impact, whilst successfully shielding all their vulnerable people, is a myth.

Their deaths aren’t rocketing because they are largely socially distancing- they’re just not doing it in such an extreme way or in a way that’s legally enforced. Their economy is suffering as a result.

Where did you see that the death rate in Sweden is trending down?

It’s difficult to tell... They don’t seem to report their figures in a consistent way. One day it’s 170, the next it’s 30.... with big drops generally over weekends and big spikes midweek.

There is currently no evidence that herd immunity is even achievable long term. We simply know very little about the immune dynamics of this virus.

The best bet for anyone at the moment is to shield as much as possible, either by social distancing or by using, ahem, protection.

@Selmaselma You can see Sweden’s daily data here. Their daily deaths peaked around the same time as ours and are trending down despite a less restrictive lockdown.

www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/

I'd rather take the Swedish data as a 7 day average. They are very unreliable on weekends.
And comparing deaths with cases, I suspect they may not be testing as much as they should.
Tests per million are about 1/3 of Portugal and Germany. About the same as the UK.

Please provide evidence that the elderly in care homes in Sweden are doing worse than in the lockdown countries. Ireland, France, Spain, Italy, the U.K. all have terrible outbreaks in care homes which are not under control despite the rest of the country being under lockdown.

Sweden’s deaths per million population is much less than the UK’s and other countries despite a less restrictive lockdown. AND really importantly, it is not increasing and looks like to be falling as well. The population is largely working from home but it suggests that the UK’s additional steps (closing shops, primary schools, restaurants etc) have minimal impact in reducing deaths. It also suggests that the harder lockdowns of Spain and Italy where people are confined to their homes were totally over the top and caused unnecessary suffering for minimal benefit.

@Lweji Can you check back in in a couple of days and see what the Swedish deaths are then (I agree deaths are the best way of measuring this). By then we should be able to establish whether Swedish deaths are falling - and not rising exponentially - and so can see what the potential implications of their more nuanced approach has been.

Deaths only relate to a couple of weeks back, though.
I've done the graph for cases and if anything it's plateauing, not falling.
The deaths at peak have been increasing, not falling over the last 4 weeks. We'll see how this one goes.

My main point is that they don't seem very good on the monitoring front.
We'll have to see how they do, but as I said, so far they're worse than Portugal, of a similar size and less resources.

Are they not keeping track of people recovering because their death rate compared to their recovered rate is insane, worse than Italy and Spain

I don’t think the UK are keeping track of their recovered rate either as far as I’m aware? I’ve assumed that this was because they need to retest people periodically to identify those who are recovered and when there is pressure on testing this doesn’t get done?

Even with testing, recoveries take much longer than deaths. Unless they consider recoveries as not having symptoms. And even so.

Seems like they started tracking it because there is some data unlike with the UK who isn't tracking it at all and then have either stopped tracking to save tests, or then they are dying much more there

According to Sweden's statistics they only have 25 deaths below the age of 50 and some of them could have underlying health problems. The average age of death in Italy was about 80, and the UK's is also high, so like flu it is an illness that affects mainly the elderly. What I don't understand is why their medics don't seem to have been affected as badly, are they doing something differently in hospitals?

www.statista.com/statistics/1107913/number-of-coronavirus-deaths-in-sweden-by-age-groups/

You do what Sweden are doing. They have a death rate as percentage of population lower than ours, and which, crucially is trending down. They expect to achieve herd immunity in a few weeks. The vulnerable are shielded during this period, after which they can leave their homes.

The vulnerable are most definitely not shielded in Sweden. The ban on visiting care homes came in the day before it was reported that a third of care homes were already infected. There is currently nothing in place to protect younger vulnerable people. There is a proposal going before parliament tomorrow about who is classed as vulnerable with the intention of bringing protection in soon. But as it stands there is nothing in place and vulnerable workers are still having to go to work.

This isn’t including the untested elderly:

*Elderly who in care homes that should read.

*who dies in carehomes. Sorry just woken up !

This

Any country looks good compared to the US.

What I don't understand is why their medics don't seem to have been affected as badly, are they doing something differently in hospitals?

I'm going to guess they have better PPE, better hygiene practices(?), and aren't having many sick in hospital because they're dying in care homes.

Or their covid doctors are all women under 40.