I live just across the border from Sweden, in Denmark. Our health authorities proposed the same strategy as Sweden - but our prime minister overruled them, and

I live just across the border from Sweden, in Denmark. Our health authorities proposed the same strategy as Sweden - but our prime minister overruled them, and chose a bigger lockdown quickly, after a serious warning from the Italian health minister about the grievous ramifications of doing just a 'measured response' like the epidemic playbooks prescribe. I'm glad she did. She chose a strategy that bought us time - and since then we've learned several important things: One is that social distancing is a much more effective weapon against viruses than we had imagined - so it's not inevitable that everyone will eventually get sick. And the other thing we've learned is that in addition to its relatively high mortality rate, this virus causes many more side effects by messing with our blood vessels, causing all sorts of organ damage. A significant number of those infected end up with decreased lung capacity or neural damage causing decreased cognitive function and/or decreased motor skills. So yes, Sweden probably took a smaller initial hit to their economy compared to ours in the first months, by not locking fully down. But what percentage of the population needs to get permanent nerve damage before it can be felt on your GDP for the next generation? Sweden's strategy does not allow them to avoid this, because the infection has already run much of its course. I'm glad we chose a more cautious approach. I think Sweden executed more or less what was considered best practice in the epidemic playbooks - but I think those playbooks will be re-written based on what this virus has taught us.