Sweden says its coronavirus approach has worked. The numbers suggest a different story

[paleotn]

(CNN)Sweden has been an outlier during the coronavirus outbreak. The country has not joined many of its European neighbors in imposing strict limits on citizens' lives, and images of people heading to work on busy streets, or chatting at cafes and bars have raised eyebrows.

Younger children have continued to go to school, although universities and schools for older students have switched to distance learning. Businesses -- from hair salons to restaurants -- have remained open, although people have been advised to work from home where possible.

snip...

The death rate in Sweden has now risen significantly higher than many other countries in Europe, reaching more than 22 per 100,000 people, according to figures from Johns Hopkins University, controlled for population.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/28/europe/sweden-coronavirus-lockdown-strategy-intl/index.html

Sorry, Swedes. I love you guys, but you can't cheat science and math....or reality in general. Expecting groups of humans, even Nordics, to do the right thing in the face of a viral pandemic is a recipe for disaster. And one hell of a gamble to take with your populace and healthcare system. In short, I am not impressed. And I also don't want to ever hear the word Sweden from the mouth of a magat ever again. They couldn't find Sweden on a map with it were outlined in red and labeled in iridescent lettering. Funny how they've all recently cozied up to the "bastion of tyrannical socialism."

[brewens]

1. I saw where one priority was protecting the nursing homes, one thing we haven't done.

I couldn't find how they are doing there. I also didn't see how they are handling things in what industry they have. I have no idea if they have much meat packing going on there. I'm pretty sure they don't have the big agricultural operations like we do either. Those differences make their plan something we probably did not want to mess with.

I've been waiting for RWer's to point to these reports and say, "look, that's how we should have done it!"

Another difference is that in Sweden, if you get sick and end up hospitalized, the bill to you is like less than $400. That's what everything and drugs are capped at. Still not a good gamble, but if you were hospitalized and missed a month of work and healed up okay, you'd be back working and probably only be a little short on beer money.

[patphil]

2. If Sweden is a success, I'd hate to see a failure.

As of the Johns Hopkins site this morning, Sweden has 19,621 confirmed cases and 2355 deaths. That's a 12% death rate.

All this in a country of a little over 10 million people.
If their population was the same of the United States, roughly 330 million, they would have about 650,000 cases, and 77,700 dead.

[Igel]

7. But they also know the death rate is lower.

If they'd only tested 100 people and had a confirmed positive case of 20, the death rate would be 2355/20, 11,755%.

If they tested 5 and 1 was positive, the death rate would be 235,500%.

And if they didn't test anybody, they'd have a death rate of 2355/0, effectively infinite. Meaning, I guess, they'd all be dead. Just because they didn't test that one random person. Sad, really.

The death rate varies a lot if the actual number of dead stayed constant ... That tells you you're looking at a bit of arithmetic where you need to make sure your numbers are right. Using "reported cases" as the denominator leads to utter nonsense in the case of Sweden (and of every other country). You need to know the actual number of infected people--for which you'd need 100% tested every couple of days for a few weeks. Lots of tests. Or you can do some testing and statistical work later.

[cilla4progress]

3. I suspect their public health system

has more capacity than ours, given their tax structure.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

4. While I think Sweden is nuts to do it their way

so far, at least, their deaths per million population is less than that in France, Italy, Spain, Belgium, and a few others.

This is a handy-dandy chart that gives lots of information.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

[defacto7]

5. All the countries you mention have very different cultures and physical conditions.

A better comparison for Sweden would be Denmark, Finland and Norway.

[paleotn]

9. Exactly....

and that's why the article compared them to their neighbors. Not places with numerous, dense urban centers like Milan, Naples, Barcelona and Madrid. Norway and Finland went conventional and it paid off. Even far more densely packed Denmark is doing 3 times better than Sweden in fatalities per 100K people.

[lettucebe]

6. This approach requires anyone thinking they may be compromised to stay away forever

Simply unacceptable. Testing and contract tracing is the answer. When someone gets a STD they must inform all partners they may have been infected, and those people MUST go get checked (nearly 100% will be infected), and get treatment.

This is the same approach we must have with this virus. If not, it will simply continue to spread and threaten tens of thousands (hundreds of tens of thousands?) of lives every year and that is not acceptable.

[Igel]

8. "Work" is the success criterion.

How's that defined?

Until you agree on the definition, you can't say if their opinion as to the success of failure has any validity.

If they point to no lockdown and curve-flattening as their criterion, then it looks to be a success.

If being like Denmark is their criterion, then it's a failure.

Their country, their population, theirs is the operational definition. We can disagree, but we should say that we disagree and they have every right to not kowtow to our judgment.

By Taiwan's standards, Denmark's a failure.

But looking at the way Taiwan maintained their low death rate, and what it entails for the future, I can't consider Taiwan a success.

You pick your values, you pick your standards, and you're most of the way there.

[paleotn]

10. Work means implementing policies and protocols...

that have been developed, hashed and rehashed for decades now to tackle this exact same scenario. You know, the one epidemiologist have been talking about for decades as a WHEN not IF scenario? There's been volumes upon volumes written about this since at least the 70's. Reams of peer reviewed research. We've had warning after warning after warning, with SARS, MERS, zika, ebola to sharpen our skills and be ready for the inevitable big one, yet we all dithered and were mostly caught hopelessly unprepared when the big one finally hit. One with an enhanced kill rate and a relatively high R0.

Once out of control, which it still is in much of the world, isolation is a last ditch effort to control the spread. But oh, no. Sweden attempted to ignore the goddamn thing not unlike Kemp in GA and people died needlessly and will die needlessly throughout red America. Those people may be simple statistics to you, but the loss of one life needlessly is a tragedy, whether you knew them or not. In this type of scenario, there will be loss of life. It's can't be completely mitigated. But to not be ready after so many warnings and so much science is gross incompetence by much of the world's governments. To fucking ignore the problem and think Swedes are somehow superior beings who will always do the right thing is downright criminal. It's complete bullshit that cost people their lives.