My piece below looks at Sweden. Recent days have seen Sweden’s Nordic neighbours Finland and Norway offer emergency medical assistance as Stockholm’s hospitals overflow & the King make an unprecedented criticism of the failed strategy. What went wrong?
newstatesman.com/world/europe/2…
newstatesman.com/world/europe/2…
Sweden started with massive advantages: more people living alone than anywhere else and a sparse population. But it ended up with death rates 9 and 10 times that of neighbours Finland and Norway
Nor has there been an economic upside for Sweden: in fact they had a bigger hit to their economy than their neighbours, as well as much worse health outcomes.
As Swedish virologist Lena Einhorn concludes: “Sweden’s strategy has proven to be a dramatic failure.”
This matters because the Swedish experiment reveals the failure of the underlying herd immunity theories of the covid-sceptics.
This matters because the Swedish experiment reveals the failure of the underlying herd immunity theories of the covid-sceptics.
We have plenty to learn from other countries, but we'd be better off learning from Australia, New Zealand, Korea, Japan and Taiwan, all with case rates 5% of the EU average. 
It isn’t Swedish lessons we need. The better lesson is the simpler one from our antipodean cousins: wallop the virus as hard as you can.
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