5 ms·

You are 100% wrong, Sweden is doing a lot of things to minimize the coronavirus impact. But I'm curious why you are claiming something that is so completely wr

You are 100% wrong, Sweden is doing a lot of things to minimize the coronavirus impact. But I'm curious why you are claiming something that is so completely wrong. Where did you get the idea from? Are you living in Sweden and strongly disagreeing with the official response, or are you living somewhere else, but "read it on the internet" ?

bnt 7y ago
Not OP but: local media in Eastern Europe bash Sweden hard with TV news pieces showing open shops and restaurants, people in groups etc, while here in Serbia we’re in complete lockdown. This also makes me feel like Sweden doesn’t care, but again, I have no first hand info except what TV and Reddit tell me. This might be OPs “source”.
- morsch 7y ago
  There's a lesson here...
- henrikschroder 7y ago
  Ok. It is possible to cherry-pick exactly whatever view you want to show by sending a camera team to Stockholm. Some places are completely deserted that would normally be bustling with people. And some places appear to be bustling with people who seem to ignore official recommendations. And some places are bustling with people who are ignoring recommendations, because Sweden has its fair share of idiots like every other country. I suspect that there is a strong wish for Sweden to fail among people in countries with severe lockdowns, because that would validate their decisions to lock down in the first place. Sweden must be "punished" for not following the herd, because if it isn't, it means that the herd was wrong, it means that suffering through a lockdown was for nothing. It means your local politicians over-reacted, and destroyed parts of the economy needlessly. And then you get these hit pieces that says everyone in Sweden is out and about, hugging and licking each other, and everyone died of the zombie apocalypse Last Thursday. My best guess is that the truth is a lot more complicated than that, and that there absolutely isn't any kind of simple linear relationship between the severity of lockdown measures and excess deaths. There are so many variables, so much random noise, and so much cultural difference between countries. If every country is doing 20-30-40-50 different measures at once, how can we even start to figure out which ones do something, and which ones don't? Is washing your hands more important than wearing a mask while you're outside? Is closing workplaces more efficient than closing schools? There's appearing evidence that kids actually are very bad transmitters of this particular virus - contrary to "common sense", which dictates that kids are filthy petri dishes that are always sick and always spreading disease. We know so little right now. It's going to take years before we'll know which countries did the right thing and which countries did the wrong thing.
  - icebraining 7y ago
    I'm sure self-validation plays a large part, but the other reason is because local critics of lockdown are using Sweden (which at least here in Southern Europe is generally associated with good governance, as opposed to ours) as an argument for their side. So even people who agree with you that it's too early to tell from the numbers, but who think the lockdown is in theory the best approach, feel forced to write stuff showing how bad things are going for them.
  - null_object 7y ago
    The "it's gonna take years to know" is the line being pushed very hard by Swedish authorities locally. Makes the massive difference in deaths-per-million here compared to our Nordic neighbors much easier to swallow. The policy will look extremely unfortunate if one of the vaccines that's already being trialled actually works...
aquadrop 7y ago
Can you describe taken measures in Sweden?
- henrikschroder 7y ago
  I feel like a broken record at this point, so I'll just copy-paste from a comment I wrote yesterday: "Universities are closed, high schools are closed, elementary schools are half-empty, people that can work from home do so, a lot of employees have been furloughed, restaurants have switched to mostly take-out, bars are closed, large events are cancelled, grocery stores reserve hours in the morning for senior citizens, elder care homes don't accept visitors, travel is way down, and people generally self-isolate and self-quarantine. Field hospitals have been constructed, recently retired healthcare workers have been asked to come back to work, vodka producers have shifted to making hand sanitizer, and other companies have shifted to making PPEs, etc." You can also check out for example Google's mobility reports: https://www.gstatic.com/covid19/mobility/2020-04-17_SE_Mobility_Report_en.pdf https://www.gstatic.com/covid19/mobility/2020-04-17_SE_Mobil...
  - tgflynn 7y ago
    So I take it this article: https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/21/analysis-is-sweden-right-in-its-handling-of-covid-19 https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/21/analysis-is-sweden-right... is either incorrect or the policy was changed very recently ? This is not a country divided. And we should also be clear that this is not a country that has done nothing. It has banned large gatherings, closed high schools and universities and told elderly people to self-isolate. But restaurants, bars, primary schools and most businesses are still open. Which directly contradicts your statement. (Your statement says that bars are closed while this article claims they are open.)
    - henrikschroder 7y ago
      That article is mostly correct, and policy wasn't changed very recently. High schools and universities closed mid-March, for example. But the article is slightly weaselly in its wording. Yes, bars and restaurants are open, but it's take-out or table service only, and you typically leave every other table empty so that people are sitting 2m away from everyone else. The actual bar part of bars and restaurants are closed. Note how the picture in that article is taken at a low angle so you can't clearly see the spacing between the people at the tables. A photo from the side would show a completely different picture.
null_object 7y ago
Looking at today's figures here: https://www.svt.se/datajournalistik/har-sprider-sig-coronaviruset/ https://www.svt.se/datajournalistik/har-sprider-sig-coronavi... Sweden is currently at around 200 deaths-per-million, as against Denmark's 68, and Finland and Norway in the 30s per million. If you're driving a bus full of people towards a cliff, is it ok to not hit the brakes just in case the bus might get back-ended by a truck driving behind? I live in Stockholm - had to walk through town the other evening to get a piece of equipment I left at the office (chose the evening to meet the least number of people was my plan). The bars and restaurants were PACKED and people were everywhere in the parks and open spaces.
tgflynn 7y ago
There have been recent news reports in the English language media that Sweden has adopted a very different and less restrictive covid-19 strategy than most other countries. So while the parent comment may be wrong and even disinformation I would not have known that if not for the conflicting replies. Example article: https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/21/analysis-is-sweden-right-in-its-handling-of-covid-19 https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/21/analysis-is-sweden-right...

bnt 7y ago

Not OP but: local media in Eastern Europe bash Sweden hard with TV news pieces showing open shops and restaurants, people in groups etc, while here in Serbia we’re in complete lockdown. This also makes me feel like Sweden doesn’t care, but again, I have no first hand info except what TV and Reddit tell me. This might be OPs “source”.

morsch 7y ago
There's a lesson here...
henrikschroder 7y ago
Ok. It is possible to cherry-pick exactly whatever view you want to show by sending a camera team to Stockholm. Some places are completely deserted that would normally be bustling with people. And some places appear to be bustling with people who seem to ignore official recommendations. And some places are bustling with people who are ignoring recommendations, because Sweden has its fair share of idiots like every other country. I suspect that there is a strong wish for Sweden to fail among people in countries with severe lockdowns, because that would validate their decisions to lock down in the first place. Sweden must be "punished" for not following the herd, because if it isn't, it means that the herd was wrong, it means that suffering through a lockdown was for nothing. It means your local politicians over-reacted, and destroyed parts of the economy needlessly. And then you get these hit pieces that says everyone in Sweden is out and about, hugging and licking each other, and everyone died of the zombie apocalypse Last Thursday. My best guess is that the truth is a lot more complicated than that, and that there absolutely isn't any kind of simple linear relationship between the severity of lockdown measures and excess deaths. There are so many variables, so much random noise, and so much cultural difference between countries. If every country is doing 20-30-40-50 different measures at once, how can we even start to figure out which ones do something, and which ones don't? Is washing your hands more important than wearing a mask while you're outside? Is closing workplaces more efficient than closing schools? There's appearing evidence that kids actually are very bad transmitters of this particular virus - contrary to "common sense", which dictates that kids are filthy petri dishes that are always sick and always spreading disease. We know so little right now. It's going to take years before we'll know which countries did the right thing and which countries did the wrong thing.
- icebraining 7y ago
  I'm sure self-validation plays a large part, but the other reason is because local critics of lockdown are using Sweden (which at least here in Southern Europe is generally associated with good governance, as opposed to ours) as an argument for their side. So even people who agree with you that it's too early to tell from the numbers, but who think the lockdown is in theory the best approach, feel forced to write stuff showing how bad things are going for them.
- null_object 7y ago
  The "it's gonna take years to know" is the line being pushed very hard by Swedish authorities locally. Makes the massive difference in deaths-per-million here compared to our Nordic neighbors much easier to swallow. The policy will look extremely unfortunate if one of the vaccines that's already being trialled actually works...

aquadrop 7y ago

Can you describe taken measures in Sweden?

henrikschroder 7y ago
I feel like a broken record at this point, so I'll just copy-paste from a comment I wrote yesterday: "Universities are closed, high schools are closed, elementary schools are half-empty, people that can work from home do so, a lot of employees have been furloughed, restaurants have switched to mostly take-out, bars are closed, large events are cancelled, grocery stores reserve hours in the morning for senior citizens, elder care homes don't accept visitors, travel is way down, and people generally self-isolate and self-quarantine. Field hospitals have been constructed, recently retired healthcare workers have been asked to come back to work, vodka producers have shifted to making hand sanitizer, and other companies have shifted to making PPEs, etc." You can also check out for example Google's mobility reports: https://www.gstatic.com/covid19/mobility/2020-04-17_SE_Mobility_Report_en.pdf https://www.gstatic.com/covid19/mobility/2020-04-17_SE_Mobil...
- tgflynn 7y ago
  So I take it this article: https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/21/analysis-is-sweden-right-in-its-handling-of-covid-19 https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/21/analysis-is-sweden-right... is either incorrect or the policy was changed very recently ? This is not a country divided. And we should also be clear that this is not a country that has done nothing. It has banned large gatherings, closed high schools and universities and told elderly people to self-isolate. But restaurants, bars, primary schools and most businesses are still open. Which directly contradicts your statement. (Your statement says that bars are closed while this article claims they are open.)
  - henrikschroder 7y ago
    That article is mostly correct, and policy wasn't changed very recently. High schools and universities closed mid-March, for example. But the article is slightly weaselly in its wording. Yes, bars and restaurants are open, but it's take-out or table service only, and you typically leave every other table empty so that people are sitting 2m away from everyone else. The actual bar part of bars and restaurants are closed. Note how the picture in that article is taken at a low angle so you can't clearly see the spacing between the people at the tables. A photo from the side would show a completely different picture.

null_object 7y ago

Looking at today's figures here: https://www.svt.se/datajournalistik/har-sprider-sig-coronaviruset/ https://www.svt.se/datajournalistik/har-sprider-sig-coronavi... Sweden is currently at around 200 deaths-per-million, as against Denmark's 68, and Finland and Norway in the 30s per million. If you're driving a bus full of people towards a cliff, is it ok to not hit the brakes just in case the bus might get back-ended by a truck driving behind? I live in Stockholm - had to walk through town the other evening to get a piece of equipment I left at the office (chose the evening to meet the least number of people was my plan). The bars and restaurants were PACKED and people were everywhere in the parks and open spaces.

tgflynn 7y ago

There have been recent news reports in the English language media that Sweden has adopted a very different and less restrictive covid-19 strategy than most other countries. So while the parent comment may be wrong and even disinformation I would not have known that if not for the conflicting replies. Example article: https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/21/analysis-is-sweden-right-in-its-handling-of-covid-19 https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/21/analysis-is-sweden-right...