So Sweden's plan was not quite so successful after all?

[goldenharvest]

Now that winter is looming, their rates have rocketed and they are bringing in restrictions. Clearly the advice to socially distance and wash hands hasn't worked.

It will be years before we know if Sweden's approach has been successful or not. They have taken the holistic long view. They have not taken the narrow short-term view this country took of focus on covid-only daily/weekly numbers.

@LittleSwede

Actually, what Stefan Löfven (prime minister equivalent) said was that during the spring people followed the recommendations which was enough to bring the numbers down, this autumn however people are becoming complacent and stricter restrictions are necessary. So the strategy did wirk in the spring and summer but just like everywhere else people began to suffer corona fatigue and became less cautious. Same as over here really.

They worked in the summer if you accept that Sweden had a much higher case and death rate than neighboring countries and that was the trade off for keeping things open.

In the UK we had the highest death rate in Europe anyway. Keeping things open would have been even more catastrophic.

@DGRossetti

UK have the additional issue of being a very small landmass, with a large, cramped population.

And an island.

If people had been able to wind in their wanderlust for a year, we wouldn't be here. But having pretty much built half the Western economy on jet setting in large numbers, that was never going to happen.

It was Covid or travel. And as a planet, we chose travel.

Exactly, this is what annoys me when people bring up Sweden to say 'that's what the UK should have done', when all it would have done is maybe stick another zero on the death toll and seen hospitals collapse under the strain.

The alternative for the UK was not Sweden, it was New Zealand and other Islands. We could have shut the borders.. However, we chose a summer of travel and open borders over being able to open up more here.

Surely the difference between the uk and NZ is that at its closest point the Uk is less then 10 miles from mainland europe wheras NZ is 2500 miles away from Australia alone. Its not so simple as 'an island is an island', we are so much more linked to other places because of geographical reasons.

@user1471588124

Surely the difference between the uk and NZ is that at its closest point the Uk is less then 10 miles from mainland europe wheras NZ is 2500 miles away from Australia alone. Its not so simple as 'an island is an island', we are so much more linked to other places because of geographical reasons.

Don’t be silly, there is no nuance in this discussion . It is of course as simple as U.K.= an island. NZ = an island. Same.

The countries that have done well closed their borders and have been really strict on quarantine etc.

Given we are an island we could have done similar. People travelling for summer holidays as only ever going to spread it, Can’t have people missing holidays though .

UK is also far more dependent on food imports than NZ - and those imports are often driven right into the country in lorries rather than deposited at docks.

Heathrow is an international air hub.

Most importantly, the U.K. can’t close it’s border with ROI under the terms of the GFA. To be effective, ROI would have had to have done the same (they didn’t).

@Bellal

Whilst it's a perfectly valid source for discussion, I can't help thinking a lot of people are chomping at the bit for Sweden to fail simply because it had the audacity to do something a little different.

Yuuuup

Surely the big win of their approach is that they didn't impose such damaging blanket restrictions and remove fundamental rights (like education and seeing family) from their whole population yet ended up in much the same position as most of the rest of Europe

I totally agree. It drives me mad when people think the covid death rate is the only factor which determines success.

I also agree Sweden has played the long game and we won’t know for yea

Why are we constantly compared to places like New Zealand then?

It’s odd, isn’t it? A sparsely populated country in the middle of nowhere with few travel links, it doesn’t compare to the UK at all!

Sorry typing one handed with a baby in the other and posted too soon!

We won’t know for years who had the best strategy in terms of sustainability, the economy and lost years from other causes.

Nz and uk can not be compared why do people do this ? Nz population is about 6 million uk 67 million on a similar size island
Uk is one of the biggest travel hubs , covid was in europe before we even realised
Japan have had few restrictions but low cases there is so much more we have to learn about covid

Early on countries like the Czech Republic locked down hard and didn't have a lot of cases and now they do.

Sweden didn't lock down hard, and now they have lots of cases.

We had a middling lockdown and now we have lots of cases.

NZ and Australia have used their comparative isolation to good effect. Maybe the UK and Ireland could have worked together - but would people have accepted closed borders all this time? It is causing real hardship to many New Zealanders and Australians who are struggling even to get home.

Most of the rest of the world is in the same boat, rising cases, regardless of approach. Hopefully the vaccines will work.

@WhoopsSomethingWentWrong

Their strategy did work in the spring and summer... their numbers were low. The situation is now evolving, as expected in winter, and their strategy is changing (as it should).

Their numbers are not low in the spring they were high relative to their population. They had a dip in the summer same as every other European country . They are now having an increase as is every country in Europe. Finland and Norway are also having increases but their numbers of dead are much much lower than Sweden so far because their lockdown in the spring worked to reduce deaths in the spring unlike in Sweden . Economically Sweden is doing worse than other Scandinavian countries ( at the moment) as well so you can't even say they have more dead but a better economy.

We don't know yet which countries have done best and wont until the pandemic is over but as things stand Sweden is definitely not a country to use as a good example of how.to handle the pandemic. Maybe they will end up being that but you can't say that at the moment at all

Germany is better comparison to make with the UK, slightly fewer cases but way less deaths.
Earlier interventions, far superior healthcare and a better care home sector account for this difference.

Strange why everyone picks up on NZ, Sweden US etc but not Germany, population, economic, culturally quite similar, travel hub.

My understanding is that Sweden never had the option to lockdown as it is forbidden in their constitution outside of wartime. So theirs was a policy of necessity rather than an active choice to be different.

UK is also far more dependent on food imports than NZ - and those imports are often driven right into the country in lorries rather than deposited at docks

Exactly. The narrative that we could have closed our borders because we're an island seems to only consider people going on holiday. The fact that huge numbers of lorries drive from mainland Europe into the UK and vice versa to keep the supply chain going gets ignored.

Cases are rising because that was always going to happen in the winter.

No country can get to 0 cases unless they closed the borders early like NZ did, cases really don't mean anything, what matters is the amount of deaths and whether there is a danger the hospitals get overwhelmed, but I have given up months ago on people realizing this.

Sweden is a success because despite not locking down their deaths did not reach nearly the number that was predicted by Ferguson (his model was the reason countries locked down), their hospitals didn't get overwhelmed and they didn't kill 200k people by delaying their cancer check ups and treatments.

Does anyone have a link on their restrictions because two weeks ago BBC reported only one area of Sweden had restrictions because cases very rising there, I am curious to know what changed there?

@CornishYarg

UK is also far more dependent on food imports than NZ - and those imports are often driven right into the country in lorries rather than deposited at docks

Exactly. The narrative that we could have closed our borders because we're an island seems to only consider people going on holiday. The fact that huge numbers of lorries drive from mainland Europe into the UK and vice versa to keep the supply chain going gets ignored.

Agree

@Bellal well said. I also think it's because people want to believe that the lockdown and all the sacrifices that come with it were worth something and Sweden kinda ruins that picture

Bellal

Whilst it's a perfectly valid source for discussion, I can't help thinking a lot of people are chomping at the bit for Sweden to fail simply because it had the audacity to do something a little different.

Not at all. It's more a swipe at all the people who refused to comply with our restrictions, citing Sweden as the "poster boy" country, and doing what they hell they wanted because they didn't think our restrictions were necessary!

This is my thinking exactly. Also that our rabid need to travel has been the reason we are having it so bad

@user1471588124

Surely the difference between the uk and NZ is that at its closest point the Uk is less then 10 miles from mainland europe wheras NZ is 2500 miles away from Australia alone. Its not so simple as 'an island is an island', we are so much more linked to other places because of geographical reasons.

Yes, but there's also a difference between 'closing the borders completely' and letting half the country piss off to Spain or France for the summer (or anywhere else) and then come back again without being tested at all or any quarantine measures enforced.

Not to mention let thousands stream into airports every day unchecked pretty much throughout the pandemic.

Why are we constantly compared to places like New Zealand then?

It's Sweden you always get from the right/herd immunity brigade. New Zealand is the opposite end of the spectrum.

It's two very different approaches. Neither country is comparable to the UK but given we've got the worst death toll in Europe even with manipulated figures (64,000 currently have Covid as cause of death on their birth certificate) then the idea we should have just carried on as normal makes no more sense in hindsight than shutting the borders does.

@TheKeatingFive

Because their neighbours are most similar to them in terms of population density, living standards, unemployment protections

That’s very simplistic.

Norway is the richest and most protectionist country in Europe, much less dependent on the outside world than Sweden. Vast swathes of Finland will be far less populated than Sweden’s busiest cities. I’m sure there’s a wealth of nuance like this, that no one is taking into account.

Again, I ask you, why are other countries not compared routinely and only to their nearest neighbours?

I don't know why other countries aren't routinely compared, perhaps other countries aren't quite as similar, but Sweden and Finland are quite similar. If they aren't similar enough to compare then there is nowhere similar enough to Sweden to compare and then its impossible to know whether its doing well or not.

It’s s Sweden you always get from the right/herd immunity brigade. New Zealand is the opposite end of the spectrum

I’m aware of that, of course.
My point is that you have people in one breath saying ‘we’re nothing like Sweden, we couldn’t have followed their approach for x, y and z reasons’ then in the next breath saying ‘we should have done what New Zealand did, we’re both islands’. When the fact is, of course, that we’re absolutely nothing like either country, and neither approach would work for us.
Neither did the one we actually took, but that’s a different thread.