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A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

sebastianrushworth.com

281–290 of 340 posts

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#281
it's same here in Czechia except only ~390 infected people died (not because of COVID, but they were infected when they died), in country of 10.6M where each month die roughly 10000 people, so roughly 400 people out of 40000 dead within 4 months of virus. truth we had mandatory masks like one of the first in Europe and even outside (insane), but we don't have them like two months, not even indoors more than one month and there is NO spike in deaths, quite opposite, there is less than 1-2 people dying per day and whole country has we will know only later what was the impact of this virus, but everything leads to completely unproportiante response with pretty much no excess deaths, if you look at yearly stats even in failed countries like UK or US

in UK is already in 6 consecutive weeks total death toll from all causes lower than 5 year average implying people who would die through the year just died within short time window and now the stats are catching up and number of excess deaths is falling

https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/1290568780251308032

I can imagine it's gonna be pretty much same in US despite anti-Trump hysteria amd scaremongering, but of course you won't have huge headlines about lower than average death toll per week, that's not very attractive for media

I wish people would be so enthusiastic about other deaths too, half million people in US die every single year from smoking, but I don't see anyone banning smoking as much as we wasted tons of money on this minor virus killing pretty much nobody

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#282
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Covid has taught me anything, it's to stop assuming a best case scenario. Even if a vaccine is approved in Q'21, due to manufacturing, supply chain and just general operations issues, it's going to be a while before a large part of the population is vaccinated. I assume they'll prioritize medical workers and the elderly, then start working through the rest of the population. It wouldn't surprise me if it takes ano…

i am in the pessimists camp who believes there wont be a COVID vaccine for decades. SARS is a corona virus and no vaccine has been found in 13 years. the common cold is a corona virus and no vaccine has been found since vaccination was invented. the new normal is going to be with us for a very long time, so adjust and plan accordingly.

The common cold is a multitude of corona viruses and a large number of other causes both viral and bacterial. There is zero business case for developing a vaccine for a single-digit percentage of common colds.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I share your concerns about authoritarians using this occasion to bend things in a bad direction but are you asserting that the virus is not a real thing or that some group with authoritarian aims is behind its release? Because if the virus is a real thing then surely protesting by gathering into crowds and falling victim doesn’t harm the bad guys right? Help me understand if you don’t mind, serious questions it’s ha…

It's a perfectly reasonable set of questions. Please note I stress that I am commenting on the virus "regime". Is the virus real? I think we should assume it is real, regardless of the facts. Let's say it is real. Should we concern ourselves with whether it is (a) natural phenomena, or (b) man-made; and whether regardless of its provenance, the spread of the virus was due to (a) chance events, or (b) intentional rele…

You asked a lot of questions that seem to imply a lot of conspiracy-driven actions, but you didn't really state any definite opinions or present any evidence that supports those implications. If you're going to "write a little book here," you're going to have to say what you believe and present the evidence for why you believe it.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#284

Sweden didn’t go into total lockdown but still did a lot. In the grocery store the cashiers are in a plastic bubble. Wherever there is a line there are marks on the floor to show where to wait to keep distance. Nobody shakes hands for quite some time. Yes, people go to Cafes/restaurants but restaurants have been assessed and assigned covid-friendly seating layouts. There are many more things that clearly separate tod…

> Sweden didn’t go into total lockdown but still did a lot. Indeed; both Sweden ( https://ycharts.com/indicators/sweden_unemployment_rate ) and Norway ( https://ycharts.com/indicators/norway_unemployment_rate ) have experienced anomalous increases in their unemployment rates that seem clearly linked to the pandemic. If the article's thesis is correct that Sweden minimally-disrupted the status quo, then we would have…

their economy sure shrink less than many other EU economies

assume there won't be any effect does not make sense in interconnected EU economies

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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. P…

> 10 QALY lost per death Average age of the covid-19 dead in Sweden is 82, average life expectancy is 83. The majority of the deaths also occurred at elder care homes where the expected survival time is less than two years. And, just like everywhere else, the covid-19 dead are much more likely to belong to certain risk groups associated with earlier deaths as well. 10 QALY lost per death sounds way, way too high to m…

> Average age of the covid-19 dead in Sweden is 82, average life expectancy is 83.

That's life expectancy at BIRTH. It would seem to me that the relevant statistic in the case of an 80 year old dying is the average life expectancy they had at 80, which is considerably more than 3 years.

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#286

"COVID is over in Sweden" is a pretty bold claim with ~400 daily infections, and increasing again as per https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/09f821667ce64bf7be6... Just like in other EU countries, it is now the younger population which seems mostly affected, and thus the mortality is lower - which is ultimately some good news. Summer holidays are now almost over though, so people are traveling home from vacation…

daily infections are irelevant if almost all of them are asymptomatic or extremely mild not requiring any hospitalization

Czechia has 200-300 daily infections and we have like 30 hospitalized patients also in country of 10.7M, so there is pretty much zero chance of dying from COVID, from those 390 people who dies in those 4 months (where usually dies around 40000 people from all causes) had other issues and coronavirus was unlikely cause of death

my guess is people who fell for this mass hysteria will be very quiet in year or two when we will look at yearly death stats and see mere blip because of COVID, where just cause of death may temporarily shift to COVID, but in the end total numbers of death will remain same. UK stats shows already for 6 weeks lower than 5 year average mortality and number of excess deaths is shrinking

https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/1290568780251308032

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#287

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.

you are missing the point and should look at yearly death stats from all causes

so yes, temporarily Sweden stats may look worse because people who would die this or next year died in short time window in these few months, but those people will be missing in stats down the road

it's already happening in UK, for 6 consecutive weeks they have lower than 5yr average death toll and excess deaths are shrinking because oft his

https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/1290568780251308032

so while you may pat yourself on shoulders how good you done without spike in the end you both reach pretty much same result spike or not

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#288
post #174

Would COVID have been a "pandemic" if we did not have the internet? The Swedish perspective is interesting. I wonder if Google trends can be broken down by nation to reflect what the concerns of different countries are. How many COVID searches in Sweden vs the US vs other nations ?

it's not even pandemic really, in Czechia we consider flu epidemic when we have 1500 active cases per 100K population, with coronavirus we are on like 50 active cases per 100K population with roughly 1-2 infected deaths (don't confuse with deaths because of virus, it's just very sick people who are at same time also infected) per day, some days 0-1, some days max 4-5 despite everything completely open - bars, restaurants, shops, you don't need face mask anywhere even indoor like 1.5 month and pretty much nobody wears face mask

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#289
post #244

"In total covid has killed under 6,000 people in a country of ten million. A country with an annual death rate of around 100,000 people." This is basically deliberate disinformation. In April and early May Sweden had 30-50% excess mortality. And this was despite actually stopping the virus through soft lockdown. What the full count would have been had they let the virus rage unchecked is hard to say, but he's compari…

Lets also not forget that sweden did withold treatment for some of those "elderly who would have died anyway". They did not recieve oxygen or ICU-Treatment and were put on palliative care.

https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2376 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4SQ-NOV-iU

Re: A Swedish doctor's perspective on Covid

#290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even though recessions cause loss of lives(as they always do), I'm not arguing we value the economy over lives. The economy will bounce back as it always does. I'm arguing that we should value all lives. We're only valuing covid lives over other lives right now. Meaning we're valuing our grandmother and great grandmothers lives over our brothers, sister, mothers, fathers even children. To be frank we have to look at…

Economies do not always "bounce back". In fact, after the major economic impacts of the 20th century, most economies worldwide required gigantic public policies targetting their rebuilding to reemerge, and even that tended to take many, many years.

With something so artificial as this lock down I'm sure it will. We basically removed millions of jobs from the economy on purpose.
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