4 ms·

> there's something else going on: either it's way more infectious (but less dangerous) than realised, or more likely, a very large proportion of people have ba

> there's something else going on: either it's way more infectious (but less dangerous) than realised, or more likely, a very large proportion of people have baseline immunity to the infection. It spreads rapidly through those who had no previous immunity and then burns out. I don't think this can be the explanation, because it would not account for how geographically localized it was in Sweden. The Stockholm metro area got hit heavily, but the rest of the country was comparatively spared, and it never became big in southern Sweden. If people had prexisting immunity to coronaviruses you'd expect the immunity to be equally distributed, so it should burn through the entire country. To me, that sounds more like there was an outbreak that started in Stockholm, but then they added social distancing measures which were enough to slow it down...

dmurray 6y ago
> it would not account for how geographically localized it was in Sweden. The Stockholm metro area got hit heavily, but the rest of the country was comparatively spared, This doesn't match the statistics from here [0] [1]. The case rate in Stockholm county is 9.5 per 1000, making it the fourth hardest hit. 15 of Sweden's 21 counties, accounting for 80% of the population, have rates of 5 per thousand or higher - higher in the urban areas. The deep south of Sweden is the exception, not the rule - despite being home to a large city in Malmö, Skåne and the four surrounding counties have only 3 cases per thousand. I don't have a better explanation for this discrepancy but it's definitely not an outbreak localized to Stockholm. [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/526655/sweden-population-by-county/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/526655/sweden-population... [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1103949/number-of-coronavirus-covid-19-cases-in-sweden-by-region/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1103949/number-of-corona...
- oxymoron 6y ago
  I think it’s an artifact of how widespread the contagion was when restrictions were implemented. Stockholm has about twice the death rate as Västra Götaland, but lower case incidence. This is all plausibly explained by the observation that the epidemic started in Stockholm, and there were already hundreds of cases there when restrictions were enacted on the 18th of March. Protective gear was in short supply, supply lines were disrupted and the spread spiralled out of control. Other parts of Sweden had a far smaller case incidence at this point, so the restrictions were more effective, and by the time it became widespread in, for instance western sweden, supplies weren’t as scarce, certain lessons had been learned etc.

dmurray 6y ago

> it would not account for how geographically localized it was in Sweden. The Stockholm metro area got hit heavily, but the rest of the country was comparatively spared, This doesn't match the statistics from here [0] [1]. The case rate in Stockholm county is 9.5 per 1000, making it the fourth hardest hit. 15 of Sweden's 21 counties, accounting for 80% of the population, have rates of 5 per thousand or higher - higher in the urban areas. The deep south of Sweden is the exception, not the rule - despite being home to a large city in Malmö, Skåne and the four surrounding counties have only 3 cases per thousand. I don't have a better explanation for this discrepancy but it's definitely not an outbreak localized to Stockholm. [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/526655/sweden-population-by-county/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/526655/sweden-population... [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1103949/number-of-coronavirus-covid-19-cases-in-sweden-by-region/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1103949/number-of-corona...

oxymoron 6y ago
I think it’s an artifact of how widespread the contagion was when restrictions were implemented. Stockholm has about twice the death rate as Västra Götaland, but lower case incidence. This is all plausibly explained by the observation that the epidemic started in Stockholm, and there were already hundreds of cases there when restrictions were enacted on the 18th of March. Protective gear was in short supply, supply lines were disrupted and the spread spiralled out of control. Other parts of Sweden had a far smaller case incidence at this point, so the restrictions were more effective, and by the time it became widespread in, for instance western sweden, supplies weren’t as scarce, certain lessons had been learned etc.