The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy • Hacker News Board

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#391

Post by evgen » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 12:53 PM UTC

native_samples wrote: post #386

evgen wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Limiting it to immediate neighbors leaves you with comparisons which have similar environment, socio-economic status, and culture/lifestyle. When doing statistical analysis you first try to control for as many potential confounding variables as possible. By limiting the comparisons to like vs like on many different variables you end up being able to make stronger claims about the consequences of active choices.

This analysis doesn't limit it to immediate neighbours. If it was doing that it'd need to include the Baltic states too and when you do that Sweden goes back to being average. In reality this argument is a form of motivated reasoning. It boils down to, if you ignore all the countries that disprove the hypothesis behind lockdowns and take a tiny number that did better than Sweden, then search backwards for some justif…

If you think that Poland, Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania share the same socio-economic status, population distribution, and cultural/lifestyle factors as Sweden then I think you are the one who is engaging in motivated reasoning. The reason we keep looking at Sweden and comparing it to its neighbors is that they are a perfect example of the success of lockdowns in preventing high death rates at the start of Covid. Anyone who claims otherwise seems to be either delusional or deceptive.

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#392

Post by ak_111 » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 12:55 PM UTC

kenneth wrote: post #390

ak_111 wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear about this, you are saying that if you wrote down a list of 100 of your close relatives, friends and co-workers that are above 60 years of age, you would happily trade "2 years of having a non miserable life", for the high statistical chance that 10 randomly selected individuals from the list will die? I think there is a cut-off at some point, but 10x more deaths is way above my threshold.

So, you're suggesting that 10% of all people over 60 years old died of Covid since this began? I would love to see you try to find me a source for this statistic. I'll wait…

No, I am saying that roughly 1% of over-70s died of covid the last two years, then 10x that.

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#393

Post by nickthemagicman » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 12:56 PM UTC

native_samples wrote: post #386

evgen wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Limiting it to immediate neighbors leaves you with comparisons which have similar environment, socio-economic status, and culture/lifestyle. When doing statistical analysis you first try to control for as many potential confounding variables as possible. By limiting the comparisons to like vs like on many different variables you end up being able to make stronger claims about the consequences of active choices.

This analysis doesn't limit it to immediate neighbours. If it was doing that it'd need to include the Baltic states too and when you do that Sweden goes back to being average. In reality this argument is a form of motivated reasoning. It boils down to, if you ignore all the countries that disprove the hypothesis behind lockdowns and take a tiny number that did better than Sweden, then search backwards for some justif…

They're fine with comparing countries all over the world with each other....

But when it comes to Sweden the one country that disproves their narrative it has to be just a neighboring countries.

It seems so disingenuous to me.

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#394

Post by nickthemagicman » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 12:59 PM UTC

evgen wrote: post #391

native_samples wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This analysis doesn't limit it to immediate neighbours. If it was doing that it'd need to include the Baltic states too and when you do that Sweden goes back to being average. In reality this argument is a form of motivated reasoning. It boils down to, if you ignore all the countries that disprove the hypothesis behind lockdowns and take a tiny number that did better than Sweden, then search backwards for some justif…

If you think that Poland, Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania share the same socio-economic status, population distribution, and cultural/lifestyle factors as Sweden then I think you are the one who is engaging in motivated reasoning. The reason we keep looking at Sweden and comparing it to its neighbors is that they are a perfect example of the success of lockdowns in preventing high death rates at the start of Covid. An…

He's calling out the fact that you compare all countries to each other except in the case of Sweden.

People compare other countries to Australia and New Zealand and Singapore all the time to justify covid lockdowns and restrictions.

But in the case of Sweden a country that outright disproves effectiveness of covid restrictions you require the frame of reference to only be the specific neighboring countries to cherry pick to fit your narrative.

It's either monstrously nightmarishly disingenuous or completely boneheaded and clueless.

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#395

Post by nickthemagicman » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 1:17 PM UTC

SeanLuke wrote: post #276

nickthemagicman wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stockholm has the population density of San Diego or Phoenix.

Stockholm has over four times the density of Phoenix.

Thanks! My bad. I guess the point stands even stronger than before.

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#396

Post by kybernetikos » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 1:21 PM UTC

kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote: post #319

nickthemagicman wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Contact Tracing sounds like an Orwellian nightmare.

Honestly, it all sounds like an Orwellian nightmare

Actually in terms of Orwellian nightmares, normalizing mask wearing in public is an incredibly significant blow you can strike against the surveillance state.

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#397

Post by Closi » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 1:27 PM UTC

michaelmrose wrote: post #201

Closi wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, It all depends how you look at the statistics. Consider the below: * Sweden had c14k deaths. Average age of death was in the eighty's - let's say Covid shortened life expectancy by 10 years on average (seems a conservative figure). Total life lost is c140k life-years. * If Sweden locked down like other countries for a year, this would have been 10m people * 1 year = 10 million years of lockdown. Let's say that pe…

Personally I used this time to improve my relationship with my wife and improve myself. The loss this year isn't the loss of socialization or income it is the literal loss of our family members and friends who died and the loss with lesser measures could only be greater. I think attempts to quantify value of life are fraught with problems and absurdities. Consider an 80 year old whose average life expectancy based on…

> The problem lies not merely with the incorrect assignment of the value time during lockdown as having zero value itself

I didn't assign zero value - I assigned it as 90% value compared to a year with no restrictions.

It's nice you used the time to improve your relationship with your wife, but I'm single and wasn't able to see my friends or family for 6 months. I like that you managed to make the most of it - but my life was put on hold.

> The idea that lives and time are so trivially fungible that you can come up with an acceptable number of hours stuck in your house watching Netflix to folks slowly suffocated in their own fluids.

This post assumes that me being inside for a year stops someone else being suffocated - but actually it's probably more like 100-500 people being inside for a year stops 1 person being suffocated (although they will still die of another cause instead, on average a few years later but sometimes many years later). Besides, it's the idea that my freedom (and that of hundreds of others per life saved) should be traded for someone else's health is my issue. Selfish? Sure, but we all are. Everyone on this forum could donate all their earnings this year to save tens of strangers lives in less developed countries but very few do in reality.

> Consider an 80 year old whose average life expectancy based on health was just a year. Certainly you wouldn't suggest he be killed if it might save some 9000 people an hour in traffic?

See the trolley dilemma - this is a different ethical decision (based on positive action, i.e. doing vs allowing harm).

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#398

Post by microtherion » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 1:50 PM UTC

lettergram wrote: post #289

kybernetikos wrote: post #60

It's so weird to see people still claiming this. Sweden has relatively few neighbors, but compare it with any of them, and it looks bad https://imgur.com/a/BlaU2SX Yes, Sweden did well compared to the EU average, but a country with very low population density, surrounded by very few neighbors that all got the virus under control very quickly has a lot of things going for it compared to the European average. The diffe…

I’m looking at those numbers and the worst was Peru - 0.5% excess deaths. Am I the only one whos just thinking none of this matters? The reality is Sweden is doing an amazing job if there’s no lockdowns. Those lockdowns led to a massive increase in suicides[1], economic damage[2], inflation[3], massive increase in drug abuse[4], lost years in education[5]. Frankly, it’s hard to imagine this virus would cause more har…

Your reference [1] does not talk about suicide, but suicide attempts, and to the extent it correlates with "lockdowns", it seems to directly contradict your claim:

> Among adolescents aged 12–17 years, the number of weekly ED visits for suspected suicide attempts DECREASED DURING SPRING 2020 compared with that during 2019 [...] mean weekly number of ED visits for suspected suicide attempts were 22.3% HIGHER DURING SUMMER 2020 and 39.1% HIGHER DURING WINTER 2021 than during the corresponding periods in 2019

(Emphasis mine). So, during three phases of the COVID-19 epidemic, suicide attempts decreased during one, increased during two. The US was in nationwide lockdown during only one of these phases, which happens to be exactly the one where suicide attempts DECREASED.

Source [2] talks about (indisputable) damage to the US economy, which you attribute to the (half assed) US lockdowns. But this is begging the question whether it was the lockdown rather than the epidemic which did the damage, and in fact, Sweden had a WORSE economic outcome than its neighbors.

> Especially if the worst case is 0.5% excess deaths

The deaths have, naturally, dominated the headlines, but there are other disabilities. One acquaintance in her early 20s has yet to regain her sense of smell after 8 months, and that's not all that rare a phenomenon: https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/public-health/when-wil...

And even athletes in top physical condition can suffer debilitating consequences for indeterminate periods of time: https://www.espn.com/f1/story/_/id/31936050/lewis-hamilton-s...

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#399

Post by Closi » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 1:50 PM UTC

michaelmrose wrote: post #267

sokoloff wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, you have to consider people who were single and dating. They had a way worse last 18 months than those in a committed, cohabitating relationship.

The larger point is that its impossible to objectively value other people's lives and any reasoning based on doing so is faulty.

Unless we make a judgement-call on value how can we balance taking away peoples freedoms over extending other peoples lives?

Consider the following questions:

* Would you accept 70 million people staying inside for a year to extend a single persons life by 10 years?

* Would you accept 500 people staying inside for a year to extend a single persons life by 10 years?

* Would you accept 5,000 people staying inside for a year to extend 10 peoples life by 10 years?

* Would you stay inside for an hour to save another persons life by a year?

* Would you stay inside for a year to save another person life by 1 year?

These are the real questions that we have to answer, and they will absolutely (and unfortunately) need people to face into the question of the value of life.

My personal answer to these questions is (in sequence) No, No, No, Yes, No. A reasonable person could answer completely different - there is no absolute right answer in any of these!

We can pretend that the answer to these questions is impossible - but these are the real decisions that policy makers need to make. How much is someone's freedom worth compared to the life of a stranger?

Re: The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to mental health, healthier economy

#400

Post by kenneth » Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 1:57 PM UTC

ak_111 wrote: post #392

kenneth wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, you're suggesting that 10% of all people over 60 years old died of Covid since this began? I would love to see you try to find me a source for this statistic. I'll wait…

No, I am saying that roughly 1% of over-70s died of covid the last two years, then 10x that.

Then you should maybe look at the context of what's being said — I was replying to a comment about Norway trading it's "10x lower" covid death rate with Sweden — where 0.014% of people died of Covid.

Your numbers are beyond absurd. But let me quickly disprove it: this study[1] shows the infection fatality rate among patients 70 and older in Stockholm was 4.3%. So, even if every single person over 60 was infected and was actually 70+, then you'd still not have 10% of the people you know over 60 die.

But obviously, 60 year olds are not all 70+, so their rate is lower, and not everyone gets infected (in Sweden so far, only about 10% of the country got infected) — so in your ridiculous example, it's over 50% likely that not a single one of the 100 people you listed dies in this contrived scenario.

But please, show me the data that shows otherwise.

[1]: https://www.folkhalsomyndigheten.se/contentassets/53c0dc391b...