3 ms·

Well, a few reasons. One is that their death rates per capita were better than several major western European countries, such as Spain, Belgium, Italy, and the

Well, a few reasons. One is that their death rates per capita were better than several major western European countries, such as Spain, Belgium, Italy, and the U.K., that did a lot more lockdown, and this suggests that the "if you don't lock down you get more deaths" idea cannot be right. The other is that, for example, Denmark opened up their elementary schools again in late April, and Finland in early May. So even the comparison to other Scandinavian countries is missing a lot of nuance. Plus, I am led to believe that Sweden DID close their high schools and colleges, since it was easier for older kids to do distance learning. The nasty secret that neither most news articles, nor this one, admits to is that, if you take all available evidence, national policy doesn't seem to have mattered much one way or the other. Sweden is in the middle of the pack among western Europe. Belarus is in the middle of the pack among Eastern Europe. Japan is in the middle of the pack (or better) in east Asia. If national policy were important, they all should be either the best or the worst. I think maybe we just did stuff, pretending it would matter, while the virus went about its normal pandemic business, and nothing we did really mattered that much.

ajmurmann 6y ago
I wonder if another interpretation might be that culture matters regardless what policies get enforced. I hear that people in Sweden stayed at home more and distanced themselves regardless of enforcement. Similarly asian countries likely already had higher acceptance of mask wearing regardless of what was enforced and so on. The praising of swedish policies seems to largely come from folks in the US wear we have no social/cultural consensuses because the country is so divided
- ghaff 6y ago
  You're still making an assumption that those culture matters have an effect. For pretty much any country (or smaller region) it's easy to construct an after the fact rationalization of the outcomes. Asia did better because people accept mask wearing--true but it's still pretty minimal in normal times. But somehow lack of mask wearing probably didn't matter in Sweden--but that's because they hate getting anywhere near another person anyway. But in the US Trump supporters not wearing masks is a big problem. Etc. I'm not going to argue that nothing matters. (Certainly protecting especially vulnerable populations is something a lot of places totally whiffed on early.) But I expect that some things people are really polarized about don't matter much.
  - rossdavidh 6y ago
    Our efforts (and by "our" I mean "the human species'") were absolutely unfocused. If we had spent the same amount of effort on getting the most vulnerable (mostly, the elderly) well away from the urban areas, we could have done a lot more good.
  - 9HZZRfNlpR 6y ago
    In very few places people in EU wear a mask in overall and public Healthcare experts say it's ineffective for general population.
SomeoneFromCA 6y ago
You cannot trust a damn word coming out of Belarus, or almost anywhere in ex-USSR. You can safely assume that death rate in Belarus is 2x-3x of reported.
- rossdavidh 6y ago
  Well Belarus' government has its issues, for sure. But I notice that the (very real) issues of reporting, only get noticed when they point the "wrong" way (whatever that is for the person speaking). When Japan had fewer cases than South Korea, the widespread explanation was that Japan must have bunk data. Similarly when China's cases dropped. I don't claim that Belarus, China, or even Japan have perfect data. But they are not North Korea, and if they had widespread devastation their neighbors would be able to tell. I don't think Belarus' data is particularly less trustworthy than Russia's. Both were willing to report cases going steeply up, when it was true.
  - SomeoneFromCA 6y ago
    Really? How do you know what is "wrong" way for me? In any case, Russian excess death is 3x of the official COVID numbers; it is a relatively well known fact, you can google Alexey Raksha, a demograph from the RosStat; he has a great explanation how Russian and the other ex-USSR numbers are made. You actually do not even need to listen to someone else, go and check RossStat numbers by yourself, they almost certainly are in open access.

ajmurmann 6y ago

I wonder if another interpretation might be that culture matters regardless what policies get enforced. I hear that people in Sweden stayed at home more and distanced themselves regardless of enforcement. Similarly asian countries likely already had higher acceptance of mask wearing regardless of what was enforced and so on. The praising of swedish policies seems to largely come from folks in the US wear we have no social/cultural consensuses because the country is so divided

ghaff 6y ago
You're still making an assumption that those culture matters have an effect. For pretty much any country (or smaller region) it's easy to construct an after the fact rationalization of the outcomes. Asia did better because people accept mask wearing--true but it's still pretty minimal in normal times. But somehow lack of mask wearing probably didn't matter in Sweden--but that's because they hate getting anywhere near another person anyway. But in the US Trump supporters not wearing masks is a big problem. Etc. I'm not going to argue that nothing matters. (Certainly protecting especially vulnerable populations is something a lot of places totally whiffed on early.) But I expect that some things people are really polarized about don't matter much.
- rossdavidh 6y ago
  Our efforts (and by "our" I mean "the human species'") were absolutely unfocused. If we had spent the same amount of effort on getting the most vulnerable (mostly, the elderly) well away from the urban areas, we could have done a lot more good.
- 9HZZRfNlpR 6y ago
  In very few places people in EU wear a mask in overall and public Healthcare experts say it's ineffective for general population.

SomeoneFromCA 6y ago

You cannot trust a damn word coming out of Belarus, or almost anywhere in ex-USSR. You can safely assume that death rate in Belarus is 2x-3x of reported.

rossdavidh 6y ago
Well Belarus' government has its issues, for sure. But I notice that the (very real) issues of reporting, only get noticed when they point the "wrong" way (whatever that is for the person speaking). When Japan had fewer cases than South Korea, the widespread explanation was that Japan must have bunk data. Similarly when China's cases dropped. I don't claim that Belarus, China, or even Japan have perfect data. But they are not North Korea, and if they had widespread devastation their neighbors would be able to tell. I don't think Belarus' data is particularly less trustworthy than Russia's. Both were willing to report cases going steeply up, when it was true.
- SomeoneFromCA 6y ago
  Really? How do you know what is "wrong" way for me? In any case, Russian excess death is 3x of the official COVID numbers; it is a relatively well known fact, you can google Alexey Raksha, a demograph from the RosStat; he has a great explanation how Russian and the other ex-USSR numbers are made. You actually do not even need to listen to someone else, go and check RossStat numbers by yourself, they almost certainly are in open access.