Swedish children continue to pour through the gates of their schools and kindergartens as the Nordic nation stands increasingly alone in Europe in its approach to tackling the coronavirus pandemic. Shops and restaurants also remain open across the country, with parks and recreational areas packed with groups enjoying the spring sunshine. The Daily Telegraph reports that despite a surge in COVID-19 patients and growing dissent among epidemiological experts, the Swedish government’s medical experts were last night standing by their decision not to follow almost all other EU nations by instituting economic and social lockdowns.
Anders Tegnell, Sweden's state epidemiologist, said the different approach reflected the independence traditionally enjoyed by government agencies like the Public Health Agency of Sweden and the reluctance of politicians to override expert advice. "I might look like the figurehead, but agencies in Sweden are very much working as a whole," he is quoted in the report as saying. "These are not decisions I take on my own in my little office."
He conceded, however, that if infection rates do start to soar and Sweden ends up in a similar situation to that Italy or Spain has faced, he would face criticism. "Of course, I and the agency will be to blame, for sure. I'm quite aware of that," he said. "But I would feel a lot worse taking a lot of decisions I don't believe in and for things to go wrong, than to take decisions I and the agency very much do believe in and for things not to work out."
Unlike Denmark and Norway, which both shut schools and kindergartens at the start of last week, and where, in Denmark at least, any gathering of more than 10 people is banned, much of life in Sweden remains unchanged.
The government has only banned events with more than 500 participants, issuing a recommendation that those who visit pubs and restaurants should be seated at a table rather than mingling at a bar, and that people taking public transport should "think carefully" about whether it's necessary. Those who fall ill with coronavirus-like symptoms need only wait two days after they feel well again before returning to work or school.
The report says the advice has not changed despite a surge of cases in Stockholm in recent days which led the city’s health chief Björn Eriksson to call for any help he could get handling the influx of coronavirus patients. "The storm is here," Eriksson said, announcing that 18 patients had died in the region in the preceding 24 hours, doubling its total death tally in a single daily update.
"We don't know how far we've come yet in this storm, but it's going to get worse."
The report says expert opinion has been divided. As early as 10 March, a group of doctors and researchers wrote a joint opinion piece in Sweden's leading medical newspaper warning of a potential "disastrous impact" on Sweden's health service if tougher actions were not taken.
The report says more than 2,000 eminent Swedish researchers and university professors have sent an open letter to the government calling for tougher measures. "I get the feeling that they want to spread the infection to get an immunity, but it's pretty cynical because it will be at the price of hundreds, if not thousands of lives," said Olle Kämpe, a professor at Sweden's leading medical university the Karolinska Institutet, who was among the authors.
The report says for now it is too early to say how the pandemic will play out. Sweden has recorded 2,806 confirmed cases of infection, which at 281 cases per million people puts it below Denmark and Norway, and just slightly ahead of the UK.
[link url="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/26/sweden-keeps-schools-borders-open-huge-experiment-virus/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr"]Full report in The Daily Telegraph[/link]