9 ms·

If France and Sweden were the same population, here's a chart of confirmed cases (7 day average) and total deaths. https://i.imgur.com/oiybcsx.png https://i.im

• liquidise 6y ago
  Sweden's approach is clearly one focused on long-term results. If Covid sees a resurgence in the fall or as nations return to relative normalcy, we can expect the infection and death counts to be multi-modal in most nations, while Sweden's might be a bell curve. For this reason alone, we are unlikely to know the effectiveness of Sweden's herd immunity for months if not years.
  • legulere 6y ago
    It would take years with current infection rates in Sweden to get herd immunity. If the plan is to reduce pension costs it seems to work.
    • natch 6y ago
      Taking years is generally the case with long term strategies.
    • thu2111 6y ago
      You're assuming current understandings of herd immunity and epidemiology are correct, which by empirical observation they aren't. The epidemic is already over in Sweden: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Sweden#Deaths https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Sweden#De... (more up to date graph: https://lockdownsceptics.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/IMG_2421.jpg https://lockdownsceptics.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/IMG_...) Yet a much lower level of infected population than conventionally understood has been reached. The models that assume the virus will continue to grow until 60%-70% have been infected are therefore wrong, reality itself is proving that. There are now a whole lot of theories being explored as to why this is. [edit: someone complained about the original graph link not matching worldometers. It's worldometers that's wrong so I replaced it with a Wikipedia link, which sources its data direct from Swedish health authorities. I left the lockdownsceptics link because it's a bit fresher]
      • legulere 6y ago
        I don’t know where “lockdown sceptics” got their data from but for me the current numbers look like a constant infection rate and only slightly reduced death rate that is also not falling: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/
    • sampo 6y ago
      > If the plan is to reduce pension costs it seems to work. We don't know. Covid19 leaves some people with long-term, perhaps permanent damage. You might lose working-age tax-paying people from workforce, having to pay them disability allowance, and this might offset part or all of your savings in pensions.
  • rumanator 6y ago
    > Sweden's approach is clearly one focused on long-term results. If Covid sees a resurgence in the fall or as nations return to relative normalcy, we can expect the infection and death counts to be multi-modal in most nations, while Sweden's might be a bell curve. Other than geometric tidiness I see no point in your comment. In fact, it ignores the denial of service impact that an epidemic has on a national health service, and plays down how it advocates for a population culling. Perhaps it's time to relearn the basic principles and merits of "flattening the curve", not to mention the benefits of gaining some time until a vaccine is developed.
    • oxymoron 6y ago
      Sweden’s hospitals hasn’t been besieged in the way seen in Italy, though, so I’m not sure that is true either. https://www.svt.se/datajournalistik/corona-i-intensivvarden/ https://www.svt.se/datajournalistik/corona-i-intensivvarden/
      • glangdale 6y ago
        There were a few articles that went by that indicated that they were being pretty cold-blooded in terms of triaging older people away from ICUs and ventilators. This isn't totally unreasonable, but it is weird from a "try to save everyone" perspective and does raise some awkward questions about their rather premature victory lap - "our ICUs aren't overloaded therefore we're OK".
        • legopelle 6y ago
          Ventilators are extremely intensive treatment.i It's forced breathing. If you're old and frail, it will kill you.
        • oxymoron 6y ago
          The picture here is unclear. Public news interviewed several dozen doctors across hospitals in Stockholm. Some of them had the impression that they were preemptively turning patients away from intensive care units, but a substantial fraction of doctors also said that these are patients that wouldn’t have been put there under normal circumstances either. I think the truth is somewhere inbetween, but it’s clear that there hasn’t been the deluge of severe cases observed out of southern Europe.
  • raverbashing 6y ago
    I'm not sure of how much of the "long-term results" was historical revisionism, but I can understand some of it. Sweden (or any other country to be honest) is nowhere near herd immunity, which kicks in at 60% (though some studies seem to have pointed to a lower number around 45%/47% something like that, anyway), Stockholm I think is around 10%, maybe 15% And even when you reach 60%, there's still an infection inertia I think it's fine for Sweden to have tried their approach, at these times, there are no real right or wrong answers, and Sweden's population probably is a little more sensible than most other countries.
  • Ma8ee 6y ago
    But Sweden isn't trying to stop the infection with herd immunity.
• ptero 6y ago
  Good points, but we still do not know how the second wave will look like in the countries that had quarantine (or in Sweden). We should revisit in a year. And there are other factors -- I personally know people whose cancer treatments were pushed out "because COVID" (for 1 and 2 months so far and counting). It is hard to quantify such things as there is no significant statistics, but lockdowns contribute to deaths, too.
  • dpau 6y ago
    on the other hand many places recorded record low injuries and fatalities from car crashes due to quarantine. i wonder how it balances out in the end.
  • notahacker 6y ago
    > It is hard to quantify such things as there is no significant statistics, but lockdowns contribute to deaths, too. There are systematic statistics on overall excess deaths which will include people whose deaths are a short term response to lockdown, so we can pretty conclusively say that lockdowns reduced short term excess deaths. They don't account for future excess deaths due to situations like cancelled operations you mentioned or different responses to a second wave, but they don't account for future deaths of COVID survivors where cardiac and lung damage caused by the disease is a comorbidity either.
  • tonyedgecombe 6y ago
    Some of those cancer treatments would have been stopped whether there was a lockdown or not. Chemo becomes much riskier when Covid is working its way through the hospital.
• kalleboo 6y ago
  Epidemiologists have been saying that per-capita comparisons don't make sense, since if you start with 10 cases, and have an Rt of 2, you get 20 cases, no matter if your population is 1 or 100 million.
  • jcims 6y ago
    At 90 days some their first 100 cases, Sweden has half the cases of China. Does that mean they have been twice as effective at fighting the disease? Half as impacted?
    • atemerev 6y ago
      Chinese statistics is unreliable. It makes sense to compare Western countries, but not Western countries to China.
      • jcims 6y ago
        OK Sweden has fewer confirmed cases (40k) than most if not all of Western Europe.
        • atemerev 6y ago
          Compared to population?
        • thomasz 6y ago
          Sweden doesn't test nearly as much as other countries in Western Europes. Comparing deaths is already complicated, comparing "confirmed cases" is completely useless.
  • deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  • kgwgk 6y ago
    And if you start with X cases, and have and Rt of 2, you get 2X cases, no matter if X is 10 or 1000.
• usaar333 6y ago
  When comparing policies, you have to factor in the costs though. As a more straightforward example, it's simpler to compare countries with closed pandemics - say Iceland or New Zealand. Iceland has much higher deaths per capita, but they didn't lock down nearly as hard (groups limited to 10, schools open for kids below age 10, etc.). If you do the math, Iceland lost about 120 extra years of life, or something like ~3 hours per person. Is depriving everyone of additional liberties for a month worth increasing life expectancy by 3 hours? The case for France vs. Sweden is a bit more complex, since Sweden, even though it isn't locked down, will be "unsafe" for large numbers of people longer. The raw math and projection models suggests Sweden will lose an extra 1-2 days of life per person, but more analysis is needed to really understand benefits and costs.
  • mantas 6y ago
    1 death is a tragedy, thousands of deaths is statistics. That "3 hours" mean that you're likely to loose one of the relatives or friends who are in high risk group. Suddenly a month of lockdown is worth to give your loved ones years or even decades.
    • thaumasiotes 6y ago
      > That "3 hours" mean that you're likely to loose one of the relatives or friends who are in high risk group. Suddenly a month of lockdown is worth to give your loved ones years or even decades. Not even close. For example, no one I know has been directly hurt by the coronavirus. And neither has anyone they know, including my friend from Wuhan. (Why "directly"? I do know someone who had a mental breakdown related to isolation.)
      • sukilot 6y ago
        Most people know more people than the average HN commenter. I suspect you don't know the fate of everyone known by everyone you know.
        • thaumasiotes 6y ago
• kqr 6y ago
  I read something different from that same graph. Assuming the French lockdown does not get rid of the virus/sickness completely, the "cases" line shows the speed at which the virus burns through the population. Sweden will have gone through its population long before France has, and will France be able to keep functioning under strict lockdown for all those months? Or even years, at the present rate? Assuming we'll all contract COVID-19 anyway, eventually, it makes little sense to adopt strong restrictive measures on personal liberty to slow the spread down to a crawl. Sure, you have to impose some restrictions in order not to overload hospitals and whatnot, but anything beyond that is just extending the suffering (both making living harder and ensuring it will go on for a longer duration), is it not?
  • asciimo 6y ago
    Delaying the spread also buys time to develop therapies and vaccines.
    • kqr 6y ago
      Yes, absolutely true and I'm glad you brought it up. I should have mentioned that in my comment too.
    • BillyTheKing 6y ago
      exactly, we've also learned that not all lockdowns are equal. Super-spreader events seem to be the driving force behind this pandemic, using effective measures we can avoid and learn to deal with super-spreader events while also allowing society to continue at a more normal rate.
    • rumanator 6y ago
      > Delaying the spread also buys time to develop therapies and vaccines. I would also add that delaying the spread also contributes to making it progressively harder to get the disease to spread.
  • chimprich 6y ago
    > and will France be able to keep functioning under strict lockdown for all those months? France has already lifted many of their lockdown restrictions. > Assuming we'll all contract COVID-19 anyway, eventually, That's a big assumption, and not necessarily correct. First, we won't all get it - herd immunity means infection rates max out at something like 60% to 90% of the population. I understand this maximum is to some extent a function of how fast your infection rates rise due to a sort of momentum effect. Second, we may be able to suppress maximum infections indefinitely (or until we get a vaccine or treatment) with tracing, local lockdowns and so on. It's not clear if this is an effective long-term strategy, and is disputed by some epidemiologists, but seems to be the leading preferred strategy by most experts. > it makes little sense to adopt strong restrictive measures on personal liberty to slow the spread down to a crawl The problem is that you can't really adopt half measures. That's linear thinking, and it's an exponential curve. You either keep the reproduction rate above 1 or below 1. Above 1 you get an accelerating increase and eventually overwhelmed hospitals. Below 1 your infection rates start halving. Luckily, the measures required for keeping R<1 don't seem to be too intolerable. Spain, Italy, France etc. have managed to squash their epidemics and are getting close to having something like normal society back.
• nickthemagicman 6y ago
  France just lifted its quarantine now it's doing exactly what Sweden is doing as every country in the world. It couldnt feed its citizens without an economy. Also note there's no exponential explosion in the rate of infection in Sweden or anywhere else that is opened its economy like the model for quarantine predicted to flatten the curve. It's reached a steady-state in all of these places.
• geoffreymcgill 6y ago
  Sweden passed France in relative Total Deaths the very next day. https://i.imgur.com/2iBcWi2.png https://i.imgur.com/2iBcWi2.png