Given the number of nations out there, clarity of message my be much more important than nuance. However, by opening to Gotland, Norway did show nuance and did not treat Sweden as a monolithic entity.
The problem there I think, is that the bordertowns and shops along the Norwegian borders are the areas of Sweden most dependent of the Norwegian trade by far. Its basically the nasty realization that other countries not opening their borders to Sweden because of high infection rates is going to hit the economy harder than a lockdown would have.
Yeah yeah, it’s super easy to trivialize the problems of other people. Let’s see if I can put this in term’s you’ll comprehend. Imagine that Canada shuts down the border and unilaterally decides that Canadian tourists are still allowed to go to Nantucket. That seems like a good idea to you?
Are we taking rates of coronavirus infection as ‘over the course of the pandemic’ or as ‘new cases right now’? Because I see from the per-county data on the Wikipedia page that Skane (which I presume is mostly Malmo cases) looks to be having its peak now, rather than back in April as Stockholm did. So going off current rates would give very different results to cumulative ones
I also note that Sweden is currently reporting a 9% deaths-per-detected-infection rate, whereas Denmark’s is 5%. This argues to me, unless Sweden has been particularly bad at the actual care of coronavirus victims, that Denmark is probably close to twice as good at detecting cases. That should probably also be factored into any comparisons too.
That info is a little outdated now. South America has been surging ahead in the deaths-per-day stakes, and according to divoc the top three world leaders are now Chile, Peru, and Brazil.
Here are the statistics from yesterday, with 2270 confirmed cases for Scania. They don’t update until 2 PM, so it will have to do. Meanwhile, Region Hovedstaden on the Danish side has 6887 confirmed cases according to the most recent numbers I was able to find, so pretty much three times as many. Even if they are better at detecting cases, that is a big difference.
Having a look … they must be cumulative cases. Because Denmark has only had about 12,000 cases in total, over the whole pandemic. So if new infections in Region Hovedstaden are going down (I don’t know if they are, but Denmark as a whole is going down for new infections/deaths) and Malmo itself is near its peak, then the Denmark side could easily be getting fewer new daily cases right now, and a border closure would make sense as a strategy
I actually have no idea what you are trying to say. I get a feeling that you are aggrieved at something, but your comment does not clarify what.
The Norwegian institute of public health, Folkehelseinstituttet, did in fact do an individual review of all the regions of Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland. You can see the criteria they used, and the results here, by expanding the “Regioner og kriterier” section.
This sort of illustrates my initial point from posting the issue here; there does not seem to be any comprehension in Sweden of why the decision was made. They are wittering about “the impact on Nordic region cooperation” and things on a similar level. They do not at all seem to grok the seriousness of the COVID issue to their Nordic neighbors.
Its not just that it seems that their perspective is different, but that trying to understand the perspective of the countries surrounding them is somehow regarded as letting the side down.
Danmarks Radio, the national public service tv/radio-station, looked into this canard, which some danish politicians has raised:
The page is in danish, but to summarize:
The comparison is between all of Sjælland (Sj) and Skåne/Halland/Blekinge (SHB) from 26. may to 4. june:
Newly diagnosed positive:
Sj 14/100.000 pop
SHB 35/100.000 pop
and Denmark tests more than Sweden, so the real difference is probably even bigger
Number of people hospitalized:
Sj 3/100.000 pop
SHB 6/100.000 pop
Number of people in ICU:
Sj 14/2.7 million
SHB 21/1.9 million
southern Sweden has about double the number per capita
The doctors and immunologists they interviewed also stated, that though there was no doubt the rate of infection in southern Sweden at that time was higher than in eastern Denmark, it wasn’t alarmingly so. But the problem is you can’t selectively open only for people from southern Sweden.
I could write a lengthy reply, but since I don’t have the patience to read the whole thread, let me at least assure you that we’re horrified about what’s happened in the different facilities for the elderly. Especially in Stockholm but in other places as well.
Why that has happened will be a matter of study and punditry for years to come. I have my own thoughts, but those are worth exactly nil, so I won’t bother.
Today, Sweden announced that Swedes may travel to a number of European nations such as Spain, Italy and France. Norway and Denmark was not on the list.
While the border between Norway and Finland is open, Finland today noted that Norwegians who travel through Sweden will not be admitted and that Norwegians have to either fly to Finland or cross the Norwegian-Finnish border.
"We will miss the Swedes this year,” said Ole Evenrud, a Norwegian pop star who goes under the stage name “Ole i’Dole,” or Ole the Idol, and is a regular performer at the festival in Halden, a Norwegian border town. “But I’m OK with the borders being closed. We have been pretty clever about the way we handled corona.”
Swedish officials, including the architect of the country’s measures to stop the spread of the coronavirus, Anders Tegnell, are not amused. They say Swedes have been stigmatized by an international campaign to prove Sweden was wrong and warn their neighbors that they are going to be much more vulnerable if a second wave of the virus hits in the fall.
. . .
Experts in the other Scandinavian countries say the higher immunity levels have not been proven through rigorous testing, and that such talk misses a major point.
“When you see 5,000 deaths in Sweden and 230 in Norway, it is quite incredible,” said Gro Harlem Brundtland, a former prime minister of Norway and the former director of the World Health Organization, during a digital lecture at the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters in May. “It will take a lot to even out this difference a year or two into the future.”
Sweden is not welcome in many of the neighboring countries. That has caused some Swedes to rethink their coronavirus strategy. The approval rating for Sweden’s handling of the coronavirus has declined since April.
To give an alternative opinion from someone that lives here and is also a citizen:
Sweden is in total denial about how badly they have screwed up their response.
Tegnell still has approval rating of 60%. A man whose list of things he has got comically wrong is as long as my arm and growing, who even now is saying that he doesn’t believe other countries have managed to achieve what they have because, basically, if you have screwed up the easiest strategy to not look as bad is to make everyone else look as bad, if not worse.
Yet he still has an approval rating of 60%.
If you discuss it with people they will still 100% defend the strategy. they are still throwing in the unironic “well Sweden took the scientific approach” whilst still not realising how monumentally inaccurate and insulting it is. This whole palaver has shown the arrogance of Swedes, something that any foreigner here is well acquainted with, for all the world to see.
Here are some stories of some foreigners who were enchanted with Sweden until the coronavirus and now have become disenchanted enough to be thinking about moving.
These are a few stories about how it felt to be in Sweden and the lived experience of dealing with coronavirus fears when others around don’t agree. Parents afraid to send their children to school but left no choice, sick people not getting tested or treated. Most people featured in the article are planning to relocate.
Can you name many leaders whose approval rating has gone up since then? Or are as high?
Yes approval of leadership there has fallen … to the mid 60s from low 70s. Elsewhere Modi in India is apparently highly approved (?!), Morrison in Australia too. Merkel and Trudeau not too far behind Swedish levels. Johnson, Trump, Marcon, Abe … all underwater. Finland’s leader (noted in another thread) now says that knowing what they know now they probably didn’t need to close schools.
That said, current still fairly high approval, “a few stories” of those with disapproval, neither really inform too much as to what will be the end result after all is said and done.
Meanwhile a story to share about two first time triathletes. Before the race they were debating if it was better to swim harder and get a lead out of the water, or to swim slower betting that they’d, as a result, do better on the bike and the run portions enough to catch up and pass the friend with similar skills and training. They each committed to their strategies. Race day! On swim split the first one is pretty far ahead. The second one’s swim split is worse than he had planned on even. Only possible conclusion is of course that the second one fucked up. The End.
Just a reminder that New Zealand’s economy is back open again, we have no requirement for social distancing, nobody is wearing masks, the only thing that is closed are our borders. We don’t have to wait months to figure out that our strategy was more effective than Sweden’s in both 1) saving lives and 2) getting back to normal again. The evidence for that is pretty crystal clear.