As a Swede, I find this article quite balanced. We are neither disaster nor success story (yet). We messed up with nurseries, royally. And we did it differently. But we still might be right, especially when excess death are counted.
Our approach would definitely not work in US. There is no such trust in government.

LOL! Jeff, you are delightful. Reputable information. Yes, posted by non-alt right/non-Q-curious and non Q people, absolutely. Just look at my beautiful spreadsheet with actual data. And the article I posted from the National Review. That's real. Everything else you think is real is fantasy.

What I'm not sure is if you don't know that it's fantasy and really believe it or that you are just playing devil's advocate.

Reread the National Review article, it will guide you back home from your Q-curious path. Seriously, read it with an open mind and take a few steps back into reality.

Thanks for the morning laugh!SmileWavy

If anyone comes out of this debacle laughing they should be tarred and feathered.

You know what is funny? We did not invent "a plan". We just followed the laid down pandemic plans that have been in place for years. The EU had a pandemic plan on how to deal with pandemics. We were just only EU state to follow it. Unsexy as it sounds, it is same old plan used with pandemics.

Seems some have seen "Outbreak" and taken it as gospel.

We had them as well, and they were substantially similar to what Sweden did.

Instead we threw them all away, our governors made illegal proclamations left and right, and thousands of people died that ought not to have (and most of those weren't even from Coronavirus).

Great perspective.

The numbers are still in question in the US. They were politicized from the beginning. The CDC has finally begun trying to unravel the mystery of who and what.

I also firmly believe that cross comparing countries and fatalities is only somewhat useful: Differences in culture, diet, age, drug use (legal and illegal), disease, hypertension, weight, etc. (could go on but the CDC does have a great list) make cross comparisons limited in strict relevance.

The "Models" were junk, mistakes were made, same as it ever was.

For some inexplicable reason, people think that the same type of bureaucrat that runs the DMV isn't in charge of the HHS and CDC.

Exactly. What is the most remarkable about Sweden's response is just how unremarkable it was - they stuck to a plan that was developed by experts in the field, developed quietly and deliberately long before any such plan was needed, as we would hope all such planning would be accomplished. And when the time came, when everyone else was in a panic, they had the resolve to stick with what they had agreed was best at a time when everyone was calm and level headed enough to have made objective, scientifically sound decisions.

Yes, very politicized. Very much made in an effort to both instill, then take advantage of, panic. Made by politicians who claimed to be "following science" but were doing nothing of the kind. Our pandemic plans were immediately brushed aside and replaced by a willy nilly, almost completely arbitrary strategy of lockdowns meant to inflict as much hardship as possible. The most incredible example of this, here in Washington, remains our Governor's assertions that pot shops, of all things, could remain open as "essential business" while many medical facilities closed. He was clearly pandering to his base.

And, yes, country to country comparisons are almost completely invalid at this point in time. Just too many variables to take into account. Anyone who claims to know why one did better or worse than another is a fool.

Against that backdrop, however, we do see one outlier, one country that did take a markedly different approach. Yet they achieved a remarkably similar result as other countries, all of whom took pretty much the same approach entailing lockdowns and other severe restrictions. We would expect the one that took the markedly different approach to have results that fall well outside of the range of those achieved by everyone else. We were told, most emphatically, that they would.

And yet here we are. The "outlier" lies well within the range established by everyone else...

As Higgins already pointed out, no one’s claiming a success. We know the current state of the pandemic.
Choosing the best way forward is the big question now with lives at stake here.

The author’s pseudoscience claims is political propaganda which does not help in that quest.
The article should be posted in a political forum where it can be discussed fully and openly,

There are so many factors at play here, social interaction norms, compliance rates, weather, public transit, etc.

What is interesting to me is the vast discrepancy in 'cases per million' in various countries with similar 'lock downs'.

This problem is being vastly oversimplified by many.

Case count integrity is only as good as the testing accuracy, testing volume, and case-count protocols (whether or not "probable" cases are counted, or just lab-confirmed, etc.).
Death count integrity is only as good as the diagnosis/COD accuracy, and reporting protocols (whether or not "probable" deaths are counted or only those with lab-confirmed infections, AND whether or not the infection was the primary or even secondary COD).

Both case and death count protocols are different in many countries, and have changed several times within many of those countries as well.

And all that is in addition to the variables you/we have mentioned previously.

At this point, I am guessing IPCC "models" on CV19 could've been more accurate...

This. Government and people in the US equally suck.

Front page local paper, scammers are pretending to be contact tracers.

Get ready folks, this fall/winter we'll be in for another wild ride.....

With Sweden, it must be remembered that they freely admit they made mistakes in their nursing homes (like NY did).

That’s where the vast majority of their deaths occurred. Like 75-80%.

If you take those admitted mistakes out, they had less than 2,000 deaths out of 10 million people.

I really don’t understand why it’s so politicized, for example, why so many non-Swedes are so determined to deem their overall approach a failure. :confused:

Thank you for your perspective. Two things:

1) When you refer to "nurseries," are you talking child care facilities and if so, can you please elaborate -- that's something new I've not seen. Or by "nurseries" do you mean "cares homes" or "nursing homes" for the aged? I'm assuming the latter as that makes the most sense, but wanted to confirm.

2) Part of what's truly remarkable about Sweden is that i) there was a plan, ii) the plan was moderate and reasonable and largely excluded masks (which per prior research had been determined to be ineffective for viral epidemics) , and iii) your country appears to have embraced the plan despite the hysterics that swept the rest of the world (hysterics which continue despite significantly lower COVID fatality and hospitalization rates in most regions).

When one further considers that Sweden's outcomes are not outside the normal distribution other countries (or states -- like NY, NJ or Massachusetts) that enacted far more draconian measures, it's hard not to be impressed with Sweden's outcome. Sure, sure, your neighbors including Norway and Finland had better mortality, but some might consider the UK, Belgium, France, Spain and Italy as European neighbors which fared similar or worse despite more aggressive (and futile?) actions.

Yes, it's the latter. He's a dern furiner, so you'll have to excuse him. :)
Careful, if you continue with common sense and logic-based observations like that, Shaun will be along shortly to accuse you of being "alt right" or "Q", lol...

80% of US deaths are age 65+

If you apply the same logic to USA, we have less than 1500 deaths per 10 milion people.

Sweden followed the science in spite of all the non-Swedes shaking their heads and telling them they are headed for disaster.

It was an apolitical decision if anything and there is no doubt about that. People who got all the predictions wrong are still trying to play down that fact.

Huh? The politicians and CNN never explained it like that. Why are my kids not going to school?

<end green>

To make you feel pain. The hope is that you vote the correct way to ease the pain. Otherwise, they will increase it. Kids are in school in the rest of the world. Most finished the previous school year in school.

emphasis mine ^ THIS is the Elephant <strike>in the room</strike> around the globe.

It's huge. SO many people SO sure of their gloom and DOOM...

All got PLAYED by the Chinese govt. This magic virus that people said would take out millions in a month or two... field hospitals constructed... Everyone needs a ventilator!... you will have no immunity even if you survive they said. The virus lasts for days on hard surfaces... no wait, you need a mask! ...

Suckers.

I see it this way:

Our multi-store buildings here in Sweden have a fire code saying:

"In case of fire in your building, go into your apartment, close the doors and put wet sheets under the door. Doors are mandated/built to resist fire for xx amount of time and firefighters are expected to be there before that. Do not rush into hallway, you will just die from smoke inhalation. Do not jump out, you will break your bones".

And one day, fire starts. Instead of following rules, people start freaking out. Some of them rush out in hallway as the "do not want to burn in". Couple of them come out unscathed, some of them die of smoke. Some try jumping out from the balcony, breaking legs in process.
One family stays in the flat just as rules say (even if it feels scary). Others point fingers to them saying "what are they doing?? They will die!". Family says: "but this is the fire code! It is deemed as best way of handling this, with least people dying!". Other say: "F$$k rules! F$$k science! I do not want to die! I am jumping from balcony!".

Statistics and science always win over reptile brain in long turn...