> Nevertheless the titular question deserves to be raised. We heard no end of derision for Sweden's outlier approach when they were having a rough time of it, b

> Nevertheless the titular question deserves to be raised. We heard no end of derision for Sweden's outlier approach when they were having a rough time of it, but now things are better - radio silence. Why? What is behind this? Things are better due to vaccinations having been administered fairly successfully. It would be unwise to accept the numbers presented in this article without any skepticism, in particular given that the author is very transparent about their agenda (discredit mask usage). The numbers are very cherry-picked to precisely fit their argument. First off - herd immunity was never the strategy to combat COVID-19 in Sweden. We had some forms of restrictions, we mostly just strayed from the 'majority' of countries, if you will, by not mandating that some businesses shut down, and by not making mask usage mandatory. Notably, we also do not mandate quarantine for arriving travelers - we merely encourage it. Sweden, their response to COVID-19 and the results of that response are most accurately discussed in the context of our close neighbours. It would be inaccurate to measure against other countries with wildly differing cultures and economic situations, it's making too much of an apples to oranges comparison. The death rate numbers in that context (which as you may note are conveniently left out by the author) speak for themselves - Swedens death rate per capita is around 3 times as high as the next neighbor, Denmark (1434/million vs 449/million), 7 times as high as Finland (190/million) and 9 times as high as Norway (157/million). These numbers should be expected to more or less converge now that we have vaccinated at fairly similar rates, and hence comparisons of recent numbers, as made in the article, is fairly useless.