Posted on 10/12/2020 9:36:15 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
My columns on Sweden’s laissez-faire approach to the coronavirus always provoke an angry response. But it is striking that, the better Sweden does, the angrier its critics become.
Like anti-Trumpers who couldn’t hide their annoyance at the success of the U.S. economy, or British Remainers who longed for a recession so as to be able to say “I told you so” about Brexit, lockdown enthusiasts determinedly screen out the good news.
They trot out three main arguments. First, they say, “You can’t compare us to Sweden. It has a low population density.” Second, they argue that “Sweden hasn’t succeeded; it has had more deaths per capita than neighboring countries.” Third, the claim that “Sweden has taken an economic hit as well — the worst of both worlds."
I’ll come to these assertions in a moment, but it is worth noting that they are all retrospective. The lockdown was initially sold across the world as the only way to avert calamity. The cost of the closures (in terms of lost liberty, lost livelihoods, and, indeed, lost lives through non-coronavirus health conditions) was so vast that there was no other way to justify it. Lockdown proponents didn’t say, “This might slightly reduce the mortality rate.” They said, “Do it or our hospitals will be overwhelmed!”
Which was, to be fair, what they initially expected to happen in Sweden. “Heading for disaster” was the headline in Britain’s right-wing Sun. “They are leading us to catastrophe,” agreed the left-wing Guardian. Time magazine reported that “Sweden’s relaxed approach to the coronavirus could already be backfiring” and quoted a doctor saying that it would “probably end in a historical massacre.” “We fear that Sweden has picked the worst possible time to experiment with national chauvinism,” chided the Washington Post.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonexaminer.com ...
ON THE ARGUMENT THAT SWEDEN HAS A LOW POPULATION DENSITY ( COMPARED TO SAY, THE UK ):
Yes, Sweden has a low population density if you divide its population by its land area. But Swedes are not evenly spaced out across their country. Most of them live in towns and cities — 85% of the population occupies 2% of its surface area. The idea that Swedes live shyly among the birch trees, plunging into their chilly lakes at the footfall of a stranger, is one of the oddest arguments to have come out of this whole unedifying debate.
ON THE ARGUMENT THAT SWEDEN HAS MORE DEATHS PER CAPITA THAN HER NEIGHBORING NORDIC COUNTRIES:
It is true that Sweden has had more coronavirus fatalities than other Nordic states. But remember that the lockdown was only intended to buy time. Infection rates are now rising faster in the rest of Scandinavia as things catch up.
In any case, though, so what? The argument for the lockdown was that there was no alternative. For that argument to work, it is not enough for Sweden to lag a bit behind Finland. Sweden would have to stick out like a sore thumb on every graph. It doesn’t.
AS FOR THE ARGUMENT THAT SWEDEN HAS TAKEN A BIG ECONOMIC HIT AS WELL:
As for the argument that the Swedish economy has taken as bad a hit as everyone else’s, it is nonsense. Obviously, a medium-sized country will be affected by a global downturn, as well as by its own voluntary distancing measures.
But Sweden got off more lightly than most. Its GDP dropped by 8.3% in the second quarter of this year (compared to 2019). In the United States, the drop was 9.5%, in Germany 11.7%, in Canada 13.5%, in Britain 21.7%, and in Spain 22.1%. In 2020 as a whole, according to a new paper by Danske Bank, Sweden is expected to see a 3.3% contraction, compared to 4.3% for the U.S., 5.8% for the United Kingdom, and 8.3% for the eurozone.
This is very much related to Alinksy’s concept that “the issue is never the issue. The issue is always the revolution.”
The virus doesn’t really matter to these people. They aren’t really trying to save lives. Making “progress” in those areas just annoys these people because it totally misses the point. The goal is to make you afraid, and make you surrender to tyranny. If Sweden is showing that surrender is unnecessary, then they are just troublemakers.
Lockdowns were misguided at best, sinister at worst.
End them now.
That's because. it's a political pandemic. The medical pandemic ceased long ago.
I've written this on my mask for when I'm forced to wear it, "This Mask is For the Anti-Trump Virus - Political Pandemic."
If I get a reaction, it's usually a thumbs up.
No one likes to be proven wrong. Duh!
(though a lot of us saw this coming from miles away)
A study of US states also showed no difference in outcomes between those that had strict mask/lockdown orders and those that had much more lax mask/lockdown orders,.
The EU is in the midst of another Wuhan spike despite “getting it right” according to Democrats.
Viruses do not just grow and then die, they are natural, and like the tide, ebb and flow with multiple spikes....which we are seeing regardless of the mitigation efforts.
bkmk
I will never make fun of Sweden again. They are the only Western country that stood up to this farcical kabuki theater.
This and the discussion about Real Covid-19 deaths (dying with or from the virus) will surely change the governor’s minds, right?
“Lockdowns were misguided at best, sinister at worst.”
What really pisses me off is that neither Trump nor his spokespersons are making the case that the high unemployment rate Biden et all are using to smear Trump are due to Democrat governors and mayors locking down their cities and preventing their citizens and local businesses from getting back to work.
The NY Times makes the same arguments the author of this article addresses.
The Times does not address the question of ... how long should the other Nordic countries lock down and what happens if the economy reopens and the airports allow foreigners to come in once again.
Or are they going to isolate themselves from the rest of the world indefinitely?
Ep99: ER Doctor from Sweden Explains it all - the Science, Logic & Philosophy!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6IeN6sgJ3g
Superb conversation with Dr. Sebastian Rushworth, covering the gamut.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Covid-19: Does Sweden have herd immunity?
https://sebastianrushworth.com/2020/09/19/covid-19-does-sweden-have-herd-immunity/
Last 3 paragraphs:
So, if Sweden already has herd immunity, what about other countries? How close are they to herd immunity? The places that have experienced a lot of covid infections, like England and Italy, have mortality curves that are very similar to Sweden’s, in spite of the fact that they went in to lockdown. My interpretation is that they went in to lockdown too late for it to have any noticeable impact on the spread of the disease. If that is the case, then they have likely also developed herd immunity by now. Which would make the ongoing lockdowns in those countries bizarre.
What about the vaccine? Will it arrive in time to make a difference? As I mentioned in my first article, lockdown only makes sense if you are willing to stay in lockdown until there is an effective vaccine. Otherwise you are merely postponing the inevitable. At the earliest, a vaccine will be widely available at some point in the middle of next year. How many governments are willing to keep their populations in lockdown until then? And what if the vaccine is only 30% effective? Or 50%? Will governments decide that is good enough for them to end lockdown? Or will they want to stay in lockdown until there is a vaccine that is at least 90% effective? How many years will that take?
So, to conclude: Covid is over in Sweden. We have herd immunity. Most likely, many other parts of the world do too, including England, Italy, and parts of the US, like New York. And the countries that have successfully contained the spread of the disease, like Germany, Denmark, New Zealand, and Australia, are going to have to stay in lockdown for at least another year, and possibly several years, if they don’t want to develop herd immunity the natural way.
Trump has made that case many times.
I think it’s in his standard stump speech.
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