Thread by @asayeed

So the whole #covid19sverige Swedish virus "experiment" controversy has been framed in terms of "herd immunity" and that's not at all what the conflict is (even @neil_ferguson agrees that it's not about herd immunity). #coronasweden

Rather, it's a conflict about an approach to risk management. Sweden's most serious critics promote an approach that involves using "easily" computable worst-case scenarios for virus death and acting accordingly... #COVID19sverige #coronavirussweden

... in an approach that uses the most drastic measures to bring about the most rapid suppression of the virus (the "hammer"). #COVID19sverige #coronasweden

Then, considering the risk that it is not *fully* wiped out, you would have bought yourself the luxury to use targeted measures (the "dance"). #COVID19sverige #covid19sweden #coronasweden

This is the *actual* point of conflict. The Swedish authorities don't believe that

1. in all cases, the total suppression strategy will be over quickly enough to be sustainable.
2. that the "dance" phase will really be a dance.

#Coronasverige #COVID19sverige

They've signalled this repeatedly: that they think in the absence of a vaccine, eradication will not fully achieved and eventually "herd-immunity-by-mass-infection" will *eventually* be reached, but not by design. #COVID19sverige #coronasweden

Instead, they think that the "dance" is going to be a series of large flare-ups with constant lockdown-related social disruption, and always teetering on the edge. So they prefer a "lockdown" strategy that doesn't feel like too much force. #Coronasverige #COVID19sverige

The worse performance of the Swedish system in terms of virus deaths is attributed to factors other than lockdown (self-admitted failures in eldercare protection), and the big comparison charts they view as comparing unlike scenarios. #COVID19sverige #coronasweden

The complex nature of this dispute does not as usual lend itself to mass/social media, where Sweden is instead held up as a poster boy of fecklessness for not going the extra mile and closing schools. #coronasweden #COVID19sverige

But there are three *actual* issues at stake:
1. the philosophy/ethics of risk management,
2. the empirical question of whether the "dance" phase can be reached in post-lockdown.
2. the social question of lockdown sustainability.
#COVID19sverige #coronasweden

(heh "3.") #Coronasverige #covid19sweden

On the last point, I think Sweden's critics are losing the argument. Even in Germany, which is supposed to be the poster child of *late responders*, there's a huge media and political pressure to open up earlier than Merkel herself wants. #COVID19sverige #coronasweden

On the risk management point, Sweden's critics are using a calculation that discounts the difficult-to-calculate social risks of lockdown (sometimes under an explicit assumption of competent crisis economic management). #COVID19sverige #Coronasverige