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Deaths in Sweden are at their highest level since 1993: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-sweden-toll/coronavirus-pushes-swedish-deaths-to-

Deaths in Sweden are at their highest level since 1993: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-sweden-toll/coronavirus-pushes-swedish-deaths-to-highest-since-1993-in-april-idUSKBN22U1S4 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-sweden... What happened in 1993? A Flu Pandemic... That no one has ever heard about, that seemed to have no lasting impact, and occurred when the population was younger and 25% smaller (thus having a proportionally much greater impact). Without the media panic, COVID-19 would have come and gone as a unusually deadly flu wave, nothing more.

chrisco255 6y ago
Yeah, agreed. The whole point of shutdowns was to prevent hospitals from being overrun, and with the exception of the few states in the U.S. that compromised their nursing home population by sending sick patients back there, the vast majority of hospitals experienced lower-than-average patient count for the past 3 months.
WildParser 6y ago
In the Gompertz-Model (that worked perfectly for China) Sweden is converging to R~0,8 - with a total death-count <6000. Germany is going to R~0,7 / <9000. Given the explosive dynamics of COVID-19 that soon converges to R<1 going for herd immunity was most likely a bad choice. For Germany cutting the flu in half worked - while the bad math of the epidemiologists-community seems to last forever...
- alkonaut 6y ago
  > going for herd immunity was most likely a bad choice. I think this has been repeated a lot. No one is "going for herd immunity". Every country including sweden has two goals: having as few as possible infected and preventing healthcare from being overwhelmed. If partial or full immunity makes the virus go away that's a fortunate side effect of slow burn, not the "goal".
hansbo 6y ago
Perhaps, but seeing as Sweden has had quite large changes in behavior (most people who can work from home, do; people are much better at washing their hands; the subways of Stockholm are significantly less crowded, going from being crowded while standing up, to always being sparse even during rush hour), it's not hard to consider the death rate being much higher than in 1993 without the media panic.
arexxbifs 6y ago
First of all, while the 1993 flu pandemic in Sweden was a severe one, the total number of deaths linked to the flu in 1993 is 566, according to the Swedish Central Statistics Bureau. Second, there was also a massive (and local) financial crisis in Sweden during 1992 and 1993, resulting in mass unemployment. The federal interest rate peaked at ~500% in 1992. While influenza deaths are always tragic, the financial crisis is what most people will remember from those years. Also, the population was roughly 15% smaller in 1993 compared to 2019, not 25%. No matter how you measure it, COVID-19 has proven to be far deadlier over the span of a few months.

chrisco255 6y ago

Yeah, agreed. The whole point of shutdowns was to prevent hospitals from being overrun, and with the exception of the few states in the U.S. that compromised their nursing home population by sending sick patients back there, the vast majority of hospitals experienced lower-than-average patient count for the past 3 months.

WildParser 6y ago

In the Gompertz-Model (that worked perfectly for China) Sweden is converging to R~0,8 - with a total death-count <6000. Germany is going to R~0,7 / <9000. Given the explosive dynamics of COVID-19 that soon converges to R<1 going for herd immunity was most likely a bad choice. For Germany cutting the flu in half worked - while the bad math of the epidemiologists-community seems to last forever...

alkonaut 6y ago
> going for herd immunity was most likely a bad choice. I think this has been repeated a lot. No one is "going for herd immunity". Every country including sweden has two goals: having as few as possible infected and preventing healthcare from being overwhelmed. If partial or full immunity makes the virus go away that's a fortunate side effect of slow burn, not the "goal".

hansbo 6y ago

Perhaps, but seeing as Sweden has had quite large changes in behavior (most people who can work from home, do; people are much better at washing their hands; the subways of Stockholm are significantly less crowded, going from being crowded while standing up, to always being sparse even during rush hour), it's not hard to consider the death rate being much higher than in 1993 without the media panic.

arexxbifs 6y ago

First of all, while the 1993 flu pandemic in Sweden was a severe one, the total number of deaths linked to the flu in 1993 is 566, according to the Swedish Central Statistics Bureau. Second, there was also a massive (and local) financial crisis in Sweden during 1992 and 1993, resulting in mass unemployment. The federal interest rate peaked at ~500% in 1992. While influenza deaths are always tragic, the financial crisis is what most people will remember from those years. Also, the population was roughly 15% smaller in 1993 compared to 2019, not 25%. No matter how you measure it, COVID-19 has proven to be far deadlier over the span of a few months.