Sweden regrets their casual policy of personal preference
Sweden's lax COVID-19 response caused too many deaths, country's top epidemiologist says | Live Science
Sweden's lax COVID-19 response caused too many deaths, country's top epidemiologist says
By
Nicoletta Lanese - Staff Writer 2 days ago
"The country should have done more, he says.
The epidemiologist who led Sweden's controversial COVID-19 response, which did not involve a strict lockdown, now says that the country should have done more to stop the spread of the virus, according to news reports.
"If we were to run into the same disease, knowing exactly what we know about it today, I think we would end up doing something in between what Sweden did and what the rest of the world has done," Anders Tegnell, the state epidemiologist of the Public Health Agency of Sweden, told Swedish Radio on June 3, according to
Reuters.
NPR reported in April. With no mandatory quarantine in place, museums, bars, restaurants, gyms, malls, schools and nightclubs remained open while residents were encouraged to follow guidelines for personal hygiene and social distancing.
Health officials also banned gatherings of 50 or more people, recommended that residents avoid nonessential travel and encouraged those over age 70 to stay home as much as possible. In late March, Sweden prohibited residents from visiting nursing homes, but the measure did not prevent the virus from reaching elderly care facilities throughout the country.
As of June 4, Sweden has reported more than 4,500 deaths associated with the virus, according to the
Johns Hopkins virus dashboard, and about half of those deaths occurred among elderly people living in nursing homes, Reuters reported.
The trend had already emerged in April, when Sweden's ambassador to the U.S., Karin Ulrika Olofsdotter, told NPR, "Once we know how the virus got into our elderly care facilities, the government can make recommendations and take measures to try to stop that, because that is the biggest tragedy of all this, that it has gotten into the nursing homes." Now, more than a month later, nursing homes still bear the brunt of Sweden's COVID-19 deaths."
I have a bit of a different take on the efforts of many countries failed to do to contain the COVID-19 virus. Containment in the general population required disciplined and consistent policies from the very beginning of the course of the COVID-19 infection, but this is very difficult for many countries that politically and culturally diverse with everyone wanting to do their own thing. To a certain extent the 80%+ of the population that were asymptomatic and mildly effected frustrated the efforts to control the pandemic The reality eventually is among the young herd immunity is inevitable.
The biggest failure in most countries was to isolate the older generations and the vulnerable consistently early on when it was known that this population would be severely effected. Also the delay of producing sufficient PPE equipment was a significant failure . The countries that did the least early in the pandemic had the greatest case count and fatalities per-capita like the USA, Brazil, Sweden, and the UK. The current policies of the Trump Administration reinforces the concept of the belief in eugenics.
The bottom line is the virus is in control. We can only reduce the impact of the virus. Of course there is no vaccine.
