By R.C.
Sun, Jul 26, 2020 11:26 a.m.
Sweden: The One Chart that Matters
While the Covid-19 epidemic continues to drag on in the United States, it's largely over in Sweden where fatalities have dropped to no more than 2 deaths per day for the last week. Sweden has been harshly criticized in the media for not imposing draconian lockdowns like the United States and the other European countries. Instead, Sweden implemented a policy that was both conventional and sensible. They recommended that people maintain a safe distance between each other and they banned gatherings of 50 people or more. They also asked their elderly citizens to isolate themselves and to avoid interacting with
https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/sweden-the-one-chart-that-matters/
Sweden: 5697 deaths. Norway: only 255 deaths. Sweden's population is only twice as large as Norway's--but Sweden has had over 22 times more deaths than Norway. So on a per population basis, people were 11 times more likely to die in Sweden than Norway. That is some success story. But I guess for some people that number doesn't matter--as long as it is someone else dying, it is fine.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to see a REAL success story, look at Taiwan: Taiwan has well over twice the population of Sweden, but instead of 5697 deaths, Taiwan has had 7. That's right, SEVEN total. To start with Taiwan did not believe WHO and China which said that the virus was not transmitted from person to person. Taiwan quickly stopped travel from China. Taiwan tracked infected people and imposed a quarantine with high fines for violation. Taiwan quickly stepped up production of alcohol hand sanitizer and masks so everyone could obtain them--and stopped price gouging. In JULY, stores here still don't have isopropyl alcohol. Everyone wore masks--school was only stopped for two weeks and then children wore masks all day except when eating. Transportation and public areas were immediately sanitized and it was done often (unlike the subway in NYC). If Taiwan had acted like Sweden they would have over 12,000 deaths--instead of a mere 7. I suspect political reasons are why some people praise Sweden when they should be praising Taiwan.
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