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Comparing Sweden with its neighbours really highlights how poorly it has done: https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=fin&areas=swe&areas=nor&areas=isl&area

Comparing Sweden with its neighbours really highlights how poorly it has done: https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=fin&areas=swe&areas=nor&areas=isl&areasRegional=usny&areasRegional=usca&areasRegional=usfl&areasRegional=ustx&byDate=0&cumulative=0&logScale=1&perMillion=0&values=deaths https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=fin&areas=swe&are... Pretty much any way you slice the data, a lot more people died in Sweden than in its neighbours. You can see the same pattern in excess all cause mortality too: Denmark 200, Finland 600, Norway 0, Iceland 0, Sweden 5500. Now Sweden has a population slightly less than Finland and Norway combined, and figures can be difficult to compare, but still it's hard to avoid the conclusion that so far, around 4000 people in Sweden have died because of differences in policy compared to its neighbours.

kzrdude 6y ago
The least you can say is that Sweden didn't manage to test as many as its neighbors did. It is claimed the influx of infected was greater etc, but lack of tests meant that it was hard to get it under control too.
api_or_ipa 6y ago
The better question that Sweden may help answer is whether shutting down the economy was worth it. Was the deaths of 5,500 people worth keeping the economy open, in other words, could you have saved more lives by pursuing other health priorities and let covid run it's courses as Sweden elected to do?
- EricE 6y ago
  This. The deaths directly attributed to the virus alone aren't the only relevant deaths. Suicides are up. Domestic violence is up. Child abuse may be up but schools are all "virtual" so good luck detecting it (as if it wasn't hard enough when kids were mostly in school). Talk about throwing out the baby with the bath water...
  - barumi 6y ago
    Could you show any data that supports your assertion about rates of suicides, domestic violence, and child abuse?
  - kybernetikos 6y ago
    I don't at all doubt that lockdown has had a number of second order problems (and benefits too), but the the figures I quoted at the end were excess all cause mortality, so those are all already included. And indeed, many countries with net 0 excess all cause mortality certainly had corona virus deaths, but lockdown and related benefits appear to have saved more people than the virus killed in those countries.
    - ynfnehf 6y ago
      I think most people who are worried about secondary effects from lockdowns don't think that these will be visible immediately during the pandemic. But rather as a higher baseline of mortality in the coming years. This is just my guess. I'm not an epidemiologist, so I have no real expertise in how these effects usually manifest themselves in the statistics.
  - bandushrew 6y ago
    in NZ suicides were down over the lockdown period.
    - blaser-waffle 6y ago
      NZ is an outlier in a lot of ways, to include population size and distance. The also cracked down on firearms ownership recently, too -- #1 choice for suicidal men.
      - bandushrew 6y ago
        huh. Thats such a weird place to go. It was only the automatic weapons, Im pretty sure any suicidal men could probably still hit themselves in the head with a single shot from a distance of 0.2 feet...
- kybernetikos 6y ago
  Actually the figures I gave at the end there were excess all cause mortality, not coronavirus deaths. So far, they have definitely not saved more lives.
- ynfnehf 6y ago
  Just for some perspective: during the 2017/18 season 2822 people died from the flu in Denmark. https://www.ssi.dk/aktuelt/nyheder/2020/influenzasasonen-2019-20-var-en-usadvanlig-sason https://www.ssi.dk/aktuelt/nyheder/2020/influenzasasonen-201...
nradov 6y ago
Sweden had a high initial death rate but now their average daily deaths have been near 1 for several weeks. So whatever they're doing lately seems to be working well. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/
- kybernetikos 6y ago
  Look at the charts I shared, they took about an extra 120 days to get the death rates down to the same level as their neighbours. Now, it's not exactly comparable since they have a larger population, but even the average daily deaths of 1 is not an indication that they're doing well compared to the other nordics.
beagle3 6y ago
Playing devil's advocate: The death counts are what they are, but on the other hand, Sweden is extremely unlikely to experience a 2nd/3rd wave, which is experienced now by the countries you listed - it's not even halftime yet fighting the virus, it's too early to say who did better. The "any way you slice the data" is not so clear either. As someone pointed out, Sweden had fewer deaths (in the thousands!) in previous flu seasons, I've read the hypothesis put forward that part of the reason Denmark has done so much better is that their weakest already succumbed to the flu in 2017/2018, whereas Sweden's were spared. Nearly impossible to prove or disprove, but there ARE ways to slice the data that make the attribution to policy less convincing. > Now Sweden has a population slightly less than Finland and Norway combined, and figures can be difficult to compare, but still it's hard to avoid the conclusion that so far, around 4000 people in Sweden have died because of differences in policy compared to its neighbours. Another way to slice the data that is important: Sweden has, by far, more black skinned immigrants than Norway (and I think Finland too) -- which are faring worth everywhere, likely some sort of sunlight/vit-D related process. A significant number of those who died in Sweden are immigrants. If you compare Sweden to Belgium (which had strict lockdown, but similar immigration patterns), the policy argument is less convincing again.
- kybernetikos 6y ago
  I find the flu argument pretty weak, but it ultimately boils down to a claim of demographic differences (that Sweden had more people at the beginning of the pandemic that were likely to die than neighbouring countries). Belgium feels like a cherry picked example, having as it does a miserably poor record compared to its own neighbours, and being rather unlike the nordic countries in lots of other likely relevant ways - climate, population density, etc. Perhaps a more likely demographic cause might be the age of the population in Sweden, which I believe does have a particularly old population. The racial/skin colour angle is difficult to evaluate. There may be something to it, but there are so many potentially confounding factors - immigrant populations are unlike the native population in a number of ways. Some of the ways they are different are that they are overrepresented in high risk groups like front line medical workers or living in poorer quality accommodation or having more difficulty getting access to health care. If the primary cause that they are overrepresented in covid-19 deaths relates to any of those, then having a lower immigrant population may just redistribute the deaths rather than reduce them (the bottom socioeconomic 10% will likely be overrepresented in deaths, and that bottom 10% may feature more or fewer immigrants).

kzrdude 6y ago

The least you can say is that Sweden didn't manage to test as many as its neighbors did. It is claimed the influx of infected was greater etc, but lack of tests meant that it was hard to get it under control too.

api_or_ipa 6y ago

The better question that Sweden may help answer is whether shutting down the economy was worth it. Was the deaths of 5,500 people worth keeping the economy open, in other words, could you have saved more lives by pursuing other health priorities and let covid run it's courses as Sweden elected to do?

EricE 6y ago
This. The deaths directly attributed to the virus alone aren't the only relevant deaths. Suicides are up. Domestic violence is up. Child abuse may be up but schools are all "virtual" so good luck detecting it (as if it wasn't hard enough when kids were mostly in school). Talk about throwing out the baby with the bath water...
- barumi 6y ago
  Could you show any data that supports your assertion about rates of suicides, domestic violence, and child abuse?
- kybernetikos 6y ago
  I don't at all doubt that lockdown has had a number of second order problems (and benefits too), but the the figures I quoted at the end were excess all cause mortality, so those are all already included. And indeed, many countries with net 0 excess all cause mortality certainly had corona virus deaths, but lockdown and related benefits appear to have saved more people than the virus killed in those countries.
  - ynfnehf 6y ago
    I think most people who are worried about secondary effects from lockdowns don't think that these will be visible immediately during the pandemic. But rather as a higher baseline of mortality in the coming years. This is just my guess. I'm not an epidemiologist, so I have no real expertise in how these effects usually manifest themselves in the statistics.
- bandushrew 6y ago
  in NZ suicides were down over the lockdown period.
  - blaser-waffle 6y ago
    NZ is an outlier in a lot of ways, to include population size and distance. The also cracked down on firearms ownership recently, too -- #1 choice for suicidal men.
    - bandushrew 6y ago
      huh. Thats such a weird place to go. It was only the automatic weapons, Im pretty sure any suicidal men could probably still hit themselves in the head with a single shot from a distance of 0.2 feet...
kybernetikos 6y ago
Actually the figures I gave at the end there were excess all cause mortality, not coronavirus deaths. So far, they have definitely not saved more lives.
ynfnehf 6y ago
Just for some perspective: during the 2017/18 season 2822 people died from the flu in Denmark. https://www.ssi.dk/aktuelt/nyheder/2020/influenzasasonen-2019-20-var-en-usadvanlig-sason https://www.ssi.dk/aktuelt/nyheder/2020/influenzasasonen-201...

nradov 6y ago

Sweden had a high initial death rate but now their average daily deaths have been near 1 for several weeks. So whatever they're doing lately seems to be working well. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/

kybernetikos 6y ago
Look at the charts I shared, they took about an extra 120 days to get the death rates down to the same level as their neighbours. Now, it's not exactly comparable since they have a larger population, but even the average daily deaths of 1 is not an indication that they're doing well compared to the other nordics.

beagle3 6y ago

Playing devil's advocate: The death counts are what they are, but on the other hand, Sweden is extremely unlikely to experience a 2nd/3rd wave, which is experienced now by the countries you listed - it's not even halftime yet fighting the virus, it's too early to say who did better. The "any way you slice the data" is not so clear either. As someone pointed out, Sweden had fewer deaths (in the thousands!) in previous flu seasons, I've read the hypothesis put forward that part of the reason Denmark has done so much better is that their weakest already succumbed to the flu in 2017/2018, whereas Sweden's were spared. Nearly impossible to prove or disprove, but there ARE ways to slice the data that make the attribution to policy less convincing. > Now Sweden has a population slightly less than Finland and Norway combined, and figures can be difficult to compare, but still it's hard to avoid the conclusion that so far, around 4000 people in Sweden have died because of differences in policy compared to its neighbours. Another way to slice the data that is important: Sweden has, by far, more black skinned immigrants than Norway (and I think Finland too) -- which are faring worth everywhere, likely some sort of sunlight/vit-D related process. A significant number of those who died in Sweden are immigrants. If you compare Sweden to Belgium (which had strict lockdown, but similar immigration patterns), the policy argument is less convincing again.

kybernetikos 6y ago
I find the flu argument pretty weak, but it ultimately boils down to a claim of demographic differences (that Sweden had more people at the beginning of the pandemic that were likely to die than neighbouring countries). Belgium feels like a cherry picked example, having as it does a miserably poor record compared to its own neighbours, and being rather unlike the nordic countries in lots of other likely relevant ways - climate, population density, etc. Perhaps a more likely demographic cause might be the age of the population in Sweden, which I believe does have a particularly old population. The racial/skin colour angle is difficult to evaluate. There may be something to it, but there are so many potentially confounding factors - immigrant populations are unlike the native population in a number of ways. Some of the ways they are different are that they are overrepresented in high risk groups like front line medical workers or living in poorer quality accommodation or having more difficulty getting access to health care. If the primary cause that they are overrepresented in covid-19 deaths relates to any of those, then having a lower immigrant population may just redistribute the deaths rather than reduce them (the bottom socioeconomic 10% will likely be overrepresented in deaths, and that bottom 10% may feature more or fewer immigrants).