STOCKHOLM (AP) — Crowds swarm Stockholm’s waterfront, with some people sipping cocktails in the sun. In much of the world, this sort of gathering would be frowned upon or even banned.
In retrospect, this denial behavior will be known as Trump Syndrome.
Argh this is so typical math avoidant he-said, she-said reporting. The reporter could have made things perfectly clear by reporting the comparative Death Rates per Capita for Denmark,Norway and Sweden rather than being math-avoidant and just going with comparative claims narratives which gives no real grounding.
This Euronews article from yesterday see the graph on deaths: https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/12/is-sweden-s-covid-19-strategy-working
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???
I hope Sweden gets away with it, but this seems risky in a way that’s already killing people. This virus will exploit any opportunity it gets. I’m just as fond of eating in restaurants and drinking in cafés as the next person, but I’m willing to wait until it’s no longer lethal.
It will be interesting to watch Norway and Denmark as they open back up. I’m particularly interested in the decision to start with opening schools; rather than hospitality.
In the US we closed colleges first, then schools, and bars as a last resort. Rather than stepping back through those steps, it would seem easier (which is not to say politically possible) to pay wages and rent for all hospitality sector businesses rather than manage the economy-wide impacts on “all people with minor children”. That’s just the economic part - not considering the loss to the kids themselves from being out of school.
Strangely, Sweden has always seemed more, well, rational to me. This kind of behaviour feels unusual to me but who can predict what anyone will do.
My family and I have been living in Sweden since last summer, so I have thoughts on this topic, but no time to write at the moment. I can say that Trumpian denial is not behind the government’s action. Sweden is not in the same situation as Brazil or Belarus. You won’t get a solid defense of the government’s action from me – we went into social-distancing mode a month ago, and our kids are home even as their schools remain open – but Sweden is a place where there is usually a reason behind the way things are done. It may not be a reason you agree with, but there is thought behind it.