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Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

nytimes.com

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Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#571
post #286

Deaths per 1M population are significantly higher in Italy(577), Spain(607) and the UK(654) than they are in Sweden(539). And Sweden have been a lot more honest in counting than most countries. There seems to be a drive to discredit the inalienable human rights approach, in this case by implying it was a financial decision; but i have to say i am impressed by the way they have handled this situation, the only respons…

Endangering the lives of others has never been an inalienable right. If not wearing a mask or being physically close to others currently breaks the non aggression principle it is reasonable for society to impose temporary measures until it no longer breaks the NAP. The countries that dealt with SARS understand this and have had the best responses globally.

> Endangering the lives of others has never been an inalienable right

That's simply wrong. I am allowed to drive a car, which is inherently dangerous to pedestrians (140,000 accidents per year in the US). I am allowed to have a lot of (or all?) contagious deseases in public, which is dangerous to the elderly and immune-compromised. I am sure there are many more examples. Small dangers are everywhere. I am all for wearing masks but let's not make up stuff.

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fine, but how does that explain disparities in outcome between European countries?

A German college truly believes that this virus was created by Adolf Gates to enrich themselves with the pandemic while helping China destroy the German economy.

The scene around conspiracy theorists Heiko Schrang and Attila Hildmann sure is fascinating. Wearing masks is the ultimate evil to them, for some reason.

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#573

Any coherent explanation of this pandemic is going to need to explain why some countries that didn't do very much (e.g. Japan) ended up with far fewer deaths per capita than countries that locked down (e.g. EU countries and the United States). Sweden is somewhere in the middle -- they are being criticized, yet other countries in Europe which locked down have ended up with a higher per capita death rate. Why is it tha…

> countries that didn't do very much (e.g. Japan) They already had masks on when others questioned their effectiveness and to this day, 95% people wear masks outside. They have hand sanitizers on pretty much every shop entrance and chairs are placed with certain distances apart. They don't wear shoes at home and public spaces don't have litters all over. They don't hug and kiss frequently like some countries do. Some…

> They don't wear shoes at home and public spaces don't have litters all over.

I might be missing something, but what does this have to do with COVID?

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#574
post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is excess mortality in Sweden https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ It is not the highest in Europe but it is very noticeable. In contrast, the surrounding countries of Finland, Norway and Denmark show almost nothing. As for which figures to take, we don't know, they are all wrong. Each country has a different way of counting depending on what they think is important. For example hospital deaths are very con…

If you read the comment you replied to again, you'll note that they didn't claim there was no excess mortality in Sweden. I'll quote the relevant bit here for you: > For Sweden the excess deaths almost exactly matches the number of Covid deaths, give or take 10%.

And they are saying that a good match between excess mortality and reported Covid death is not, in itself, an argument to say that Sweden is doing a good job. It has more excess mortality than its neighbors even if these might be underreporting Covid death so this argument is not exactly relevant.

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main problem in Sweden hasn't been the rejection of a lockdown, it's not protecting the elderly care well enough. But this is what happens when there are barely any educated people within it. Compared to Norway for example that have a mandatory 3 year nursing education to be working within the elderly care. Heck the absolute majority of the elderly didn't even get any treatment once the infection was a fact. And…

You are allowed to travel everywhere in Norway now if you are a resident, even if you are from Oslo. However, there was a couple of weeks where that was not allowed. Norway is actually almost back to normal,except you can't have gatherings of over 200 people. It has been this way for almost a month now, and there have not been any increase in confirmed covid cases yet, which is surprising.

> However, there was a couple of weeks where that was not allowed.

News to me and I've been here in Norway all through the COVID time. There was a period when we were not allowed to spend the night in a holiday home unless it was in the same kommune as one's usual residence but as far as I remember there was never any country wide ban on internal travel. There were a few kommunes who set up border controls that were most likely illegal but that's about it.

And resident status is not relevant here either. As long as you went in to quarantine on entry to the country (was 14 days, now 10), whether resident or not, you are free to travel where you like.

If you know that anything I have said here is incorrect I would appreciate it if you could provide addresses of web pages (Folkehelseinstituttet, osv.) that would set me right.

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#576

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> countries that didn't do very much (e.g. Japan) They already had masks on when others questioned their effectiveness and to this day, 95% people wear masks outside. They have hand sanitizers on pretty much every shop entrance and chairs are placed with certain distances apart. They don't wear shoes at home and public spaces don't have litters all over. They don't hug and kiss frequently like some countries do. Some…

> They don't wear shoes at home and public spaces don't have litters all over. I might be missing something, but what does this have to do with COVID?

It means, whatever you have stepped on outside, you don't just spread it all over your house... Maybe you don't step on Covid infected materials but who knows? It's just another possible source.

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#577

The jury is still out on "economic failure." The evidence cited on the economy is thin at best. The main piece of evidence is that "Sweden’s central bank expects its economy to contract by 4.5 percent this year, a revision from a previously expected gain of 1.3 percent." Economic forecasts are ridiculously unreliable. In the US, economists forecast (on average) that 8 million jobs would be lost in May. Instead there…

Wasn't that uptick in us employment found out to be a calculation error though?

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#578
post #450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed that it certainly can feel "fluked" or random which areas are overwhelmed and which recover, but I have to disagree with the idea that Vietnam didn't take it particularly seriously. I was there in February, for around a month. As a foreigner, I was regularly receiving SMS updates about covid infections. There was a website which detailed exactly when and where people were testing positive. Hotels and guest hou…

I didn't say they weren't taking it seriously. I made a few specific claims, none of which you've discredited or even mentioned.

There may have been a misunderstanding.

I didn't post to score points against you or at all discredit your personal experience.

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#579

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sweden is somewhere in the middle -- they are being criticized, yet other countries in Europe which locked down have ended up with a higher per capita death rate. According to this [0], Sweden is 5th in Europe but given that you have Italy (first outbreak in europe), closely followed by the second, Spain and the incompetent response of the UK Government, this only leaves Belgium, which seems to count pretty much al…

Based on the ideology of the lockdowns, Sweden ought to be the worst in Europe, but it’s not. If Italy waited too long, then Sweden waited even longer! Where is the apocalypse that was predicted? Sweden being in the middle of the pack, despite not locking down when others did, is hard to explain.

This is a very complicated topic that involves things like trust in government, sense of community, etc ...

Lockdown is a last resort measure, not the first response.

All things considered, Sweden is doing remarkably well but if you compare it with its scandinavian neighbours rather than with Italy or the UK then things look appalling.

Re: Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains

#580
post #578

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't say they weren't taking it seriously. I made a few specific claims, none of which you've discredited or even mentioned.

There may have been a misunderstanding. I didn't post to score points against you or at all discredit your personal experience.

Not sure what you mean. I was responding to this:

> I have to disagree with the idea that Vietnam didn't take it particularly seriously

I didn't present that idea, so I'm not sure how you can disagree with it.

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