10 ms·

Meanwhile, Sweden never had shelter in place orders, and they did not fare worse than France or Ireland.

jeffbee 6y ago
According to EuroMOMO, Sweden's excess mortality rate this year is "high", France's is "low" and Ireland's is "no excess". https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/
- asabjorn 6y ago
  Sweden is doing better than NYC without the catastrophic economic consequences NYC is experiencing https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wsj.com/amp/articles/swedens-doing-better-than-new-york-state-11589221909 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wsj.com/amp/articles/sweden...
  - rayiner 6y ago
    Sweden benefits from being very moderate in density compared to NYC. Stockholm is comparable in size and density to Washington, DC. The death rate in Stockholm is about 5 times higher than DC.
    - asabjorn 6y ago
      3,3k has so far died in Sweden and the population is 10 million. I believe 22k has died out of 8.3m in NYC, so NYC seems clearly worse. The strategy was to face more infections short term in favor of quick herd immunity so it’s actually a very positive sign for the strategy that the death rate is not higher than NYC. Considering that the curve has flattened and herd immunity is projected in a couple of weeks, it is not clear the total deaths in virus lifecycle will be bad.
      - rayiner 6y ago
        NYC is clearly worse, but NYC is also vastly worse than any other place in the US. In terms of density and scale of international travel (or the lack of both), Sweden is more comparable to Maryland or Virginia. Virginia, with 8.5 million people, has had less than 900 deaths. DC, which is only a bit smaller than Stockholm and similar in density, has had just 328 deaths, compared to over 1,200 in Stockholm
        nick_kline 6y ago
        Correct about Sweden. We can compare Sweden to Switzerland (8.5 million vs 10 mil pop in Sweden). Switz has 1870 deaths, Sweden 3460. Sweden is far worse per capita than it's small northern euro neighbors too (actually deaths per million, Sweden, then Norway, Finland, Denmark are (343) and (42, 51, 92). IHME [1] estimates Sweden will have 5760 deaths, Switz 1935. Correcting for relative populations (10/8.5) Switz's 1935 * 10/8.5 = 2275 roughly expected. I'm not sure why people have seized on Sweden as doing it right, but they will kill about 3.5k extra people compared to Switz (excess deaths). Compared to their northern neighbors they about 8x worse. All this info at https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ except projections. [1] https://covid19.healthdata.org/switzerland https://covid19.healthdata.org/switzerland
        henrikschroder 6y ago
        > I'm not sure why people have seized on Sweden as doing it right Sweden is one of the countries that have enacted the least strict measures, it's an outlier in strategy, and has therefore attracted a lot of attention from people wishing to use it as an example while arguing for their own strategy. According to the lockdown aficionados, Sweden is a zombie wasteland whose officials are gleefully sacrificing the elderly, while the nation's youth is cavorting on the streets spreading the virus indiscriminately, and in two weeks the death rate is going to spike, just you wait! Therefore, lockdowns are a necessity! According to the lockdown skeptics, Sweden is a bastion of freedom and liberty where it's business as usual, not a single restaurant or bar closed, all schools are open, and the streets are full of people enjoying life like normal. Sweden has a death rate similar to many European countries, therefore lockdowns are completely unnecessary! The truth is of course that both of these viewpoints are wrong, and most importantly, you can't assume that applying Sweden's strategy anywhere else would get the same results. But that doesn't stop people from cherrypicking exactly the stats they like in order to argue for the strategy they like. Also note that IHME has up until recently been absolutely, fantastically, horribly wrong in their projections for Sweden. Like many other comparison sites, they're using the reporting dates for deaths instead of the actual death dates. If you want better data for Sweden, please check out this site instead: https://adamaltmejd.se/covid/ https://adamaltmejd.se/covid/
- henrikschroder 6y ago
  The map shows per-week z-score excess, not some kind of yearly total. What you said only applies to week 17. During week 15 (Easter), Sweden had "very high" excess, Ireland had "low" excess, while UK, France, Spain, and Italy had "extremely high" excess.
  - apostacy 6y ago
    I believe far more people are going to die over the next few years from the economic collapse than the pandemic would have killed had we used the Swedish model. For most readers of HN, this has just been like a vacation. Our investments have lost some value. We will have to lower our expectations for our next jobs. Maybe we can't buy a second car. Most countries have burned down the village in order to save it.
willis936 6y ago
What’s your metric? I can’t find a country doing worse than Sweden. Even the US has slowed its growth rate by a large amount more than Sweden. Just look at the plots, dude.
nelaboras 6y ago
But Swedish were self-isolating, companies allowing flexibility, all citizens have affordable access to great quality healthcarez etc. It's a functional country with high trust. The obligation to stay at home is not necessary when society and even economic actors respond reasonably.
C1sc0cat 6y ago
Apart from the deaths in care homes
- 2rsf 6y ago
  And especially among immigrants, that's a big "Apart" but still something that could have been done differently relatively easily if we only knew
jacobush 6y ago
Yet, most sheltered. Because we were advised too. And almost everyone modified their behaviour.

According to EuroMOMO, Sweden's excess mortality rate this year is "high", France's is "low" and Ireland's is "no excess". https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/

asabjorn 6y ago
Sweden is doing better than NYC without the catastrophic economic consequences NYC is experiencing https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wsj.com/amp/articles/swedens-doing-better-than-new-york-state-11589221909 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wsj.com/amp/articles/sweden...
- rayiner 6y ago
  Sweden benefits from being very moderate in density compared to NYC. Stockholm is comparable in size and density to Washington, DC. The death rate in Stockholm is about 5 times higher than DC.
  - asabjorn 6y ago
    3,3k has so far died in Sweden and the population is 10 million. I believe 22k has died out of 8.3m in NYC, so NYC seems clearly worse. The strategy was to face more infections short term in favor of quick herd immunity so it’s actually a very positive sign for the strategy that the death rate is not higher than NYC. Considering that the curve has flattened and herd immunity is projected in a couple of weeks, it is not clear the total deaths in virus lifecycle will be bad.
    - rayiner 6y ago
      NYC is clearly worse, but NYC is also vastly worse than any other place in the US. In terms of density and scale of international travel (or the lack of both), Sweden is more comparable to Maryland or Virginia. Virginia, with 8.5 million people, has had less than 900 deaths. DC, which is only a bit smaller than Stockholm and similar in density, has had just 328 deaths, compared to over 1,200 in Stockholm
      - nick_kline 6y ago
        Correct about Sweden. We can compare Sweden to Switzerland (8.5 million vs 10 mil pop in Sweden). Switz has 1870 deaths, Sweden 3460. Sweden is far worse per capita than it's small northern euro neighbors too (actually deaths per million, Sweden, then Norway, Finland, Denmark are (343) and (42, 51, 92). IHME [1] estimates Sweden will have 5760 deaths, Switz 1935. Correcting for relative populations (10/8.5) Switz's 1935 * 10/8.5 = 2275 roughly expected. I'm not sure why people have seized on Sweden as doing it right, but they will kill about 3.5k extra people compared to Switz (excess deaths). Compared to their northern neighbors they about 8x worse. All this info at https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ except projections. [1] https://covid19.healthdata.org/switzerland https://covid19.healthdata.org/switzerland
        henrikschroder 6y ago
        > I'm not sure why people have seized on Sweden as doing it right Sweden is one of the countries that have enacted the least strict measures, it's an outlier in strategy, and has therefore attracted a lot of attention from people wishing to use it as an example while arguing for their own strategy. According to the lockdown aficionados, Sweden is a zombie wasteland whose officials are gleefully sacrificing the elderly, while the nation's youth is cavorting on the streets spreading the virus indiscriminately, and in two weeks the death rate is going to spike, just you wait! Therefore, lockdowns are a necessity! According to the lockdown skeptics, Sweden is a bastion of freedom and liberty where it's business as usual, not a single restaurant or bar closed, all schools are open, and the streets are full of people enjoying life like normal. Sweden has a death rate similar to many European countries, therefore lockdowns are completely unnecessary! The truth is of course that both of these viewpoints are wrong, and most importantly, you can't assume that applying Sweden's strategy anywhere else would get the same results. But that doesn't stop people from cherrypicking exactly the stats they like in order to argue for the strategy they like. Also note that IHME has up until recently been absolutely, fantastically, horribly wrong in their projections for Sweden. Like many other comparison sites, they're using the reporting dates for deaths instead of the actual death dates. If you want better data for Sweden, please check out this site instead: https://adamaltmejd.se/covid/ https://adamaltmejd.se/covid/
henrikschroder 6y ago
The map shows per-week z-score excess, not some kind of yearly total. What you said only applies to week 17. During week 15 (Easter), Sweden had "very high" excess, Ireland had "low" excess, while UK, France, Spain, and Italy had "extremely high" excess.
- apostacy 6y ago
  I believe far more people are going to die over the next few years from the economic collapse than the pandemic would have killed had we used the Swedish model. For most readers of HN, this has just been like a vacation. Our investments have lost some value. We will have to lower our expectations for our next jobs. Maybe we can't buy a second car. Most countries have burned down the village in order to save it.

willis936 6y ago

What’s your metric? I can’t find a country doing worse than Sweden. Even the US has slowed its growth rate by a large amount more than Sweden. Just look at the plots, dude.

nelaboras 6y ago

But Swedish were self-isolating, companies allowing flexibility, all citizens have affordable access to great quality healthcarez etc. It's a functional country with high trust. The obligation to stay at home is not necessary when society and even economic actors respond reasonably.

C1sc0cat 6y ago

Apart from the deaths in care homes

2rsf 6y ago
And especially among immigrants, that's a big "Apart" but still something that could have been done differently relatively easily if we only knew

jacobush 6y ago

Yet, most sheltered. Because we were advised too. And almost everyone modified their behaviour.