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A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

sebastianrushworth.com

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Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#111

Post by refurb »

RobLach wrote: post #93

2 separate studies are pointing to herd immunity being impossible because SARS-CoV-2 antibodies disappear over time and previous carriers could become infected again. There haven’t been any cases of reinfection afaik but we’ll see in due time. https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.09.20148429v... https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2025179

Right, but antibodies often are transient for some diseases. Once the infection disappears, the antibody levels drop. But if post-infection there are T-cells that recognize the virus, then future exposure to the virus results in a rapid and robust immune response.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#112

Post by gnicholas »

agildehaus wrote: post #95
gnicholas wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your Finland comparison misses the author's argument. His claim is not that they haven't had many more deaths than Finland, but that Finland will catch up with Sweden. His theory seems to be that there will be a more-or-less fixed number of deaths per million, unless countries are willing to wait for a vaccine (which he thinks they won't do).

Delusional. For that, ~2700 more people would need to die in Finland. 14 people have died in Finland since June 1st and they're typically reporting 0 now. In Sweden, 40 people died ON June 1st. Both countries have it under control now. But it's clear Finland's shutdown saved lives.

Perhaps! I'm not an expert on COVID, and I've not been following trends in Europe. His claim would only make sense if Finland's low current rates are due to lockdown, and Sweden's low current rates are not because of lockdown but because COVID is no longer spreading much due to prior spread.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#113

Post by refurb »

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #104
ouid wrote: post #8

Sweden is effectively as locked down as anywhere else. The prevalence of the virus is diminishing there because people are not going out and getting sick, rendering R_t<1. I don't participate in social distancing because my government says to, and I certainly don't stop because my government says to either.

> I don't participate in social distancing because my government says to, and I certainly don't stop because my government says to either. In an ideal world, the government would listen to the experts, they would reach some reality-based and science-based consensus, and then the people would follow those conclusions because it's the right thing to do. But that's an ideal world.

As a trained scientist, I'm skeptical of these calls for "scientific consensus". Sure, there are many areas of science where there is clear consensus. But if you're talking about a new area of science, where we don't have much data, it's not unusual for experts to not agree on things.

And sure, one of them is likely right and one wrong, but we won't know which one until we get more data.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#114

Post by dang »

hn_check wrote: post #110
refurb wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if I understand you correctly, although Sweden hasn't closed schools, children aren't attending? And although non-essential businesses aren't closed, Swedes aren't going to those stores? And masks aren't mandated, but most people are wearing them?

The snark is adorable and comically out of place. Swedish schools closed for the summer break just as COVID was peaking. They return in just over a week. Businesses are sparse because few people are shopping. Restaurants and bars were closed, and other than that have strict reduced occupancy. But Florida man is sure that Everything Is Normal. It's hilarity. That "look they didn't close their schools"...when they were…

Would you please stop posting in the flamewar style to HN? You break the site guidelines routinely, and we ban accounts that do that.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#116

Post by Florin_Andrei »

refurb wrote: post #113
Florin_Andrei wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't participate in social distancing because my government says to, and I certainly don't stop because my government says to either. In an ideal world, the government would listen to the experts, they would reach some reality-based and science-based consensus, and then the people would follow those conclusions because it's the right thing to do. But that's an ideal world.

As a trained scientist, I'm skeptical of these calls for "scientific consensus". Sure, there are many areas of science where there is clear consensus. But if you're talking about a new area of science, where we don't have much data, it's not unusual for experts to not agree on things. And sure, one of them is likely right and one wrong, but we won't know which one until we get more data.

These statements are true in general, of course.

Now, as for the current pandemic, data is plenty already.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#117

Post by tsherr »

Udik wrote: post #39
mcguire wrote: post #16

" Covid has at present killed less than 6000 in Sweden. It is very unlikely that the number of dead will go above 7,000. An average influenza year in Sweden, 700 people die of influenza. " The average number of people who die of influenza in the US is about 35,000. So we should expect 350,000 deaths and then we'll be all good?

350k deaths sounds like a huge number, but it's important to take in account how many of those would have died anyway in the next two or three years. Dying at 80 is not the same as dying at 20.

Says the person who isn't 80. You're mind bogglingly unaware of perspectives outside your own.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#118

Post by refurb »

hn_check wrote: post #110
refurb wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if I understand you correctly, although Sweden hasn't closed schools, children aren't attending? And although non-essential businesses aren't closed, Swedes aren't going to those stores? And masks aren't mandated, but most people are wearing them?

The snark is adorable and comically out of place. Swedish schools closed for the summer break just as COVID was peaking. They return in just over a week. Businesses are sparse because few people are shopping. Restaurants and bars were closed, and other than that have strict reduced occupancy. But Florida man is sure that Everything Is Normal. It's hilarity. That "look they didn't close their schools"...when they were…

No snark intended, I'm actually trying to understand what's happening versus what's being reported.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#119

Post by tripletao »

agildehaus wrote: post #46

Finland has roughly half Sweden's population but 5% of their COVID deaths. Sweden's economy contracted 8.6% to the EU's 11.9%. Hope those 5000+ unnecessary deaths were worth 3.3%. "Considering that 70% of those who have died of covid are over 80 years old, quite a few of those 6,000 would have died this year anyway." Wow.

At $100k per quality-adjusted life-year and 10 QALY lost per death, those 5k deaths are $5B, about 1% of Sweden's GDP. So by the same math used to determine if medical treatments are cost-effective, it's breakeven if that GDP difference persists for about four months. We should also account for QALY lost due to people who get severely ill but recover, but I'd guess the net result is surprisingly close to breakeven. Perhaps this means the policymakers just chose different but roughly equivalent (by that math) options, or perhaps that's just chance.

Of course you could say that math is horrible and inhumane, and any equation involving dollars and human lives will feel that way. But the point is that health care spending is already rationed by something like that standard, and every dollar of GDP that disappears is a dollar that's unavailable to spend in other ways (including medical treatments that are cost-effective by that standard).

To be clear, I think Sweden erred by not mandating masks, which seem cost-effective to me by that standard. Their response otherwise seems reasonable to me, not obviously better than stricter approaches but not obviously worse.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#120

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

agildehaus wrote: post #95
gnicholas wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your Finland comparison misses the author's argument. His claim is not that they haven't had many more deaths than Finland, but that Finland will catch up with Sweden. His theory seems to be that there will be a more-or-less fixed number of deaths per million, unless countries are willing to wait for a vaccine (which he thinks they won't do).

Delusional. For that, ~2700 more people would need to die in Finland. 14 people have died in Finland since June 1st and they're typically reporting 0 now. In Sweden, 40 people died ON June 1st. Both countries have it under control now. But it's clear Finland's shutdown saved lives.

Finland has it under control for now, but they should expect to see future waves of infection, since nearly every country that did a hard lockdown has. So the question is, will they be able to do the same severe response 2, 3, 4 times before they get the required supply of vaccines?
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