Sweden: higher Covid-19 death rate while failing to collect on economic gains • Hacker News Board

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

#631

Post by thu2111 » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 1:00 PM UTC

refurb wrote: post #454

cyrksoft wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you attribute every excess death to covid alone, at least directly? There are many countries where family violence has increased, alcohol consumption, suicide, etc. I don’t think every excessive death can be attributed to covid.

Not only that, but if you have a patient in a hospice with stage 4 lung cancer who dies and tests positive for Covid, does that go in the "Covid death" bucket? Honest question. I don't know the answer. I assume it's left up the physician's judgement?

It's not left up to physician's judgement, it's mandated that all such deaths are reported as COVID-19 deaths. This is based on WHO guidance.

This has upset a lot of physicians and pathologists, exactly because their own judgement is being overridden and they know it's broken the statistics completely. In the UK they are calling for a systematic review of all deaths attributed to COVID:

https://www.hsj.co.uk/coronavirus/systematic-reviews-to-disc...

The COVID death counts are hopelessly over-counted. This is why there's a cottage industry of people pointing out things like "COVID deaths" which mysteriously also suffered from being murdered, or drug overdoses, or undiagnosed leukaemia.

Then you get into the problem of care homes being authorised to report COVID deaths without any testing or formally trained opinion at all. In France, as soon as there is a "suspected case" in a nursing home (e.g. due to coughing), all deaths are considered "suspected Covid19 deaths", and as soon as there is a "confirmed case" in a nursing home (even if symptomless), all deaths are considered "confirmed Covid19 deaths":

https://covidinfos.net/covid19/deces-dus-au-covid-19-le-nomb...

Over-counting of COVID is absolutely rampant. The top voted post on this thread is claiming that all excess deaths must be caused by COVID, as if shutting down hospitals have no impact. In reality:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/06/25/nhs-treatment-de...

"More children died after failing to get timely medical treatment during lockdown than lost their lives because of coronavirus, new research by the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) suggests."

Of course the numbers for children are small. For older people it's more extreme. In the UK emergency ward admissions halved, including for cardiac arrests. There's now a backlog of 2.4 million cancer patients awaiting diagnosis or treatment. The excess deaths from lockdowns will be with us for a long time.

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

#632

Post by rurban » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 1:19 PM UTC

londons_explore wrote: post #99

leto_ii wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an important observation. In the Netherlands, where I live, I've had a number of people look at me with great surprise and mistrust when I mentioned that the Dutch have done a terrible job with this epidemic. The Guardian plots show that the Netherlands is one of the worst when it comes to under-reporting. This is not to say however that the Swedes have done a good job. While their numbers are credible, their…

In an average year, 13/1000 Swedes die anyway . Considering COVID has closed many of life's fun things, there will be an entire generation of people who have effectively "lost" a year of the things they hoped they would do in their lifetime. By stating open, Sweden might decrease life expectancy in years, but increase it in terms of 'things achieved in a lifetime'

During a Swedish flu season 1800 die per week. I haven't seen this number yet in this year's flu season.

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

#633

Post by mekkkkkk » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 1:44 PM UTC

Swedish officials has said over and over again that neither herd immunity nor economics is the basis for the strategy chosen. They tried to strike a balance between the impact of containment measures (isolation, mental health, lack of education etc) and minimizing the spread of the virus. Of course the first point is extremely hard to quantify, and thus the hard numbers are horrifying.

Most people in Sweden are taking plenty precautions and isolate on a voluntary level, highly encouraged by all institutions. However, if you are stuck inside with abusive parents or are getting depressed by the isolation, you have the choice to go out.

As others have mentioned, the true failure has been in elder care. How the virus was allowed to ravage care centers is completely unacceptable.

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

#634

Post by claudeganon » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 2:00 PM UTC

fomine3 wrote: post #432

claudeganon wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

South Korea never had lockdowns, outside of shutting down bars when they traced some superspreading events back to them. The idea that they’re somehow less committed to human rights when they’ve preserved freedom of movement, while avoiding mass deaths, is laughable on its face.

SK traced people in a bar by cellular location data and payment data without permit. I think it's not good for human rights.

The entire digital advertising industry is in greater violation of human rights, by this measure.

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

#635

Post by kalleboo » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 2:14 PM UTC

mekster wrote: post #556

twblalock wrote: post #499

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…

Pretty much all of that aside from the masks apply to Sweden as well.

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

#636

Post by SomeoneFromCA » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 2:23 PM UTC

gridlockd wrote: post #612

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And also to provide time for treatments to appear, with the eventual prospect of a vaccine. And also to avoid panic and shortages of essentials caused by mass avoidable deaths and work absenteeism, both of which would have been the inevitable and predictable outcome of attempting to carry on as normal. IMO the argument is already over. In fact there shouldn't have been an argument at all. There was never a rational c…

> In fact there shouldn't have been an argument at all. This is an awful way of thinking. > There was never a rational case for trying to avoid lockdown This is untrue. Many virologists and epidemiologists made rational cases against lockdowns. Sweden followed the strategy of Anders Tegnell, who is a renowned epidemiologist. The case for or against lockdowns was ultimately decided by the perception of public opinion,…

First of all no, not lower than France's, but it was much lower for a while. Secondly, their economic contraction might be somewhat less, yet the death toll compared to Norway much higher, which did not suffer much worse economically. The question boils down was it worth for a modest economical benefit allow 5000 people to die or not. Some people think it is okay, most do not.

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

#637

Post by SomeoneFromCA » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 2:24 PM UTC

rurban wrote: post #632

londons_explore wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In an average year, 13/1000 Swedes die anyway . Considering COVID has closed many of life's fun things, there will be an entire generation of people who have effectively "lost" a year of the things they hoped they would do in their lifetime. By stating open, Sweden might decrease life expectancy in years, but increase it in terms of 'things achieved in a lifetime'

During a Swedish flu season 1800 die per week. I haven't seen this number yet in this year's flu season.

really? a link?

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

#638

Post by pw201 » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 2:50 PM UTC

nickthemagicman wrote: post #444

leto_ii wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All preventable deaths should be prevented - this is the gold standard. In reality, of course, things don't work out that way. The analogy with a flu season is deeply misleading. The coronavirus has, in half a year, killed more people than the worst flu seasons, with extraordinary measures in place all over the world. It's completely reasonable to assume that without lockdowns we would have had millions of deaths alr…

Coronavirus deaths aren't preventable. Youre are going to have the same number of deaths sooner or later as long as the hospitals aren't overwhelmed. Corona isn't going anywhere.

> Youre are going to have the same number of deaths sooner or later as long as the hospitals aren't overwhelmed.

Even assuming there's never a vaccine or effective cure, this is not true: temporarily reducing the R number (lockdowns, distancing, masks) reduces the overshoot in the total number of people who get the disease (some proportion of which will die). It's the difference between scenario 0 and scenario 1 in the excellent https://ncase.me/covid-19/ playable models.

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

#639

Post by revnode » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 3:00 PM UTC

CaptainZapp wrote: post #428

revnode wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> These are all problems caused by the economic system. What problems? There are no major structural problems yet. There will be major structural problems if OP's ideas are implemented because they're not sound. That's not related to the economic system, that's related to OP's ideas.

> What problems? There are no major structural problems yet. I'd argue that a 40% jobless rate is a major structural problem. The real shame about this is that it's absolutely avoidable to a big degree. At a cost? Sure, but I'd argue that it's exactly this, which a civilized society makes.

> I'd argue that a 40% jobless rate is a major structural problem.

In what country? In the US, the unemployment rate is 11.1% right now?

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

#640

Post by disgruntledphd2 » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 3:12 PM UTC

gridlockd wrote: post #611

disgruntledphd2 wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Phase 3 is normally where most medicines fail. Covid (any vaccine based treatment really) is even more difficult as you need to wait for six months to assess transmission.

> Covid (any vaccine based treatment really) is even more difficult as you need to wait for six months to assess transmission. Technically, you don't. There are volunteers ready to get infected with SARS-CoV2 and I wouldn't put my money on "ethics" standing in the way in this case.

That is true, but you still need a relatively long time to make sure there aren't any nasty side-effects.