I think I will keep an eye on Sweden and Norway with the virus

[_Sheffjs_]

Two totally different approaches as Norway has strict lock down rules and Sweden.....

https://afp.omni.se/lockdown-can-wait-sweden-goes-its-own-way/a/6jAzML?fbclid=IwAR2cDK-uHrL92iXI10vbFuWmb4_2vTdb8ugLtZoYwDMdfO3b0TVpfV_wZkQ

[..]

Latest is that Stockholm is to be quarantined from the rest of Sweden

[F6Dave]

I work with a woman from Sweden.  Here mom and brother still live there, in a more rural area.  They talked this week and have some limited restrictions, like restaurant operating at 25% capacity with customers scattered around.  They have very few cases so far, but are concerned about that changing when the city folk begin arriving to use their summer homes.

[_Sheffjs_]

Stockholm will most likely be the first bad spot, should be interesting in a few weeks with the different strategies.  Texting my ride buds sounds like no big deal now.

[Savago]

Sorry for bringing back to life a dead topic, but I did kept one eye on it (I have a few friends living in Helsinki, Copenhagen, Trondheim).

It seems that keeping the restaurants/shops/etc open does have a price:

[Willow]

Comparing numbers by nation or state is not meaningful.  Percentage of population would carry some meaning.  Sweded has twice the population of the other nations listed.

Displaying the number of deaths and tying it to social distancing is not meaningful.  The purpose of social distancing is not to ultimately reduce deaths.  It was to "flatten the curve", that is to slow down the pace of deaths so the hospitals wouldn't be overwhelmed.

The number of people who are going to catch the virus are ultimately going to catch the virus.  The people who are going to die resulting from the virus are ultimately going to die of the virus.  Social distancing will not change the numbers, only the rate, whether they are sooner or later.

The real question is were the Swedish hospitals overwhelmed?

We did major damage to economies and spent unbelievable amounts of money on a fool's errand.  Short of a quickly developed vaccine or a miraculous cure the rate of the disease makes no change in the ultimate life tolls of the disease. 

[carolinarider09]

What Willow said.   

[_Sheffjs_]

Comparing numbers by nation or state is not meaningful.  Percentage of population would carry some meaning.  Sweded has twice the population of the other nations listed.

Displaying the number of deaths and tying it to social distancing is not meaningful.  The purpose of social distancing is not to ultimately reduce deaths.  It was to "flatten the curve", that is to slow down the pace of deaths so the hospitals wouldn't be overwhelmed.

The number of people who are going to catch the virus are ultimately going to catch the virus.  The people who are going to die resulting from the virus are ultimately going to die of the virus.  Social distancing will not change the numbers, only the rate, whether they are sooner or later.

The real question is were the Swedish hospitals overwhelmed?

We did major damage to economies and spent unbelievable amounts of money on a fool's errand.  Short of a quickly developed vaccine or a miraculous cure the rate of the disease makes no change in the ultimate life tolls of the disease. 

I so agree with Carl, and to add my doctor bud in Motala has mentioned a new twist for the numbers,  Sweden does not give the same weight in trying to save the compromised. Moreover sorry no ventilator for you, send this one to the ward where they offer a soft landing. Sorry whether I am right or wrong I think the Swedish approach is correct.  

[Savago]

Comparing numbers by nation or state is not meaningful.  Percentage of population would carry some meaning.  Sweded has twice the population of the other nations listed.

Willow: as you correctly mentioned, the population size has to be factored.

Sweden has 2x the population of Finland, but as the chart shows, almost 10x more deaths by Covid-19.

Delaying infections allows both to avoid overloading the hospitals, as also gives more time to doctors and scientists to figure it out better ways to treat the sick people and maybe improve survival rates.

[Savago]

Another thing to consider: we currently have near 983K confirmed cases with 55K deaths in the USA.

That is a lethality rate of near 5.6%, contrast that with Germany that is around 3%, that means the odds of *dying* of Covid-19 in the USA are almost twice of Germany.

You may recall that a few weeks ago I assumed a lethality of 4% in the USA, being optimistic. I guess I was too much optimistic.

Their new cases are going down, while our cases are going up (https://www.evaluate.com/covid-19-daily-update).

[Willow]

Comparing country to country, culture to culture, may be flawed.  There have been multiple reports indicating why number of deaths accredited to COVID-19 may be different from one country to another because the practices of reporting COVID-19 are not the same.

A recent random study in New York City and a couple of California counties indicate the occurrence of COVID-19 was up by a factor of  50 - 80 times as the only reported numbers were of diagnosed cases.  That is to say that people who acquired the disease and weren't under a hospital's or doctor's physical exam were not reported.  The numbers considering those testings indicate numbers closer to 0.03%. 

[carolinarider09]

The problem is that you are comparing "known" cases when we actually know that the number of those infected with Corona-19 is much higher than the number cited in the post above.  

There are many sources you can find to support this. This is just one.

"COVID-19 Lethality Not Much Different Than Flu, Says New Study"

From April 17, 2020.

https://reason.com/2020/04/17/covid-19-lethality-not-much-different-than-flu-says-new-study/

[3fan4life]

Right or wrong, Sweden does not seem to have a worse virus problem than its neighbours, according to the numbers of declared cases.

On Monday, Sweden reported 2,016 confirmed cases of the new coronavirus, while Norway and Denmark -- which each have around half the population of Sweden -- reported 2,371 and 1,450 cases, respectively.

# of deaths has way too many unknown factors.

Age, Pre Existing Conditions and many others.

Total # of cases is a better comparison.