How is Sweden doing with COVID-19 today?

Air pollution cannot multiply exponentially? The non-linear risk of pandemics makes them VERY hard to price and makes overreaction the safer bet! I would love to see more money thrown at solving air pollution (it's a massive problem) but you are naive if you think that the hundreds of billions spent on COVID would make a dent in shifting the emissions profile of global industry. Just look at the costs California incurred over 40 years to get their air pollution problem down to manageable. There are sections of NYC where 0.3-0.4% of the population has died with upper bounds on infection rates of 50-70%, that implies a 0.5-0.8% IFR or so. It's not out of the question that had adopted zero mitigation measures we would have doubled that death rate in March/April/May due to resource exhaustion, naive treatment protocols, general lack of information (Remember Wuhan and parts of Italy had 5%+ IFR for the first wave!) It's likely the IFR is somewhere in the 0.3-0.5% range these days, but was close to 1% even in the USA at the beginning of the pandemic (see a good, minimal assumption, model of IFR here: https://covid19-projections.com/estimating-true-infections/). So I stand by my assumption that 1-2% of the population would have died had we allowed unmitigated viral spread in March (assuming 80-90% population infected within 3 months)

^good post

Sweden already at 50% of its first wave peak?!?

Air pollution cannot multiply exponentially?

-No. It's preventable though.

Hundreds of billions thrown at covid?

World wide we are talking tens of $ trillions (In august I saw an estimate that said $35.3 in covid costs, come october they said it was not that expensive, only $28 trillion. Look it up if you want, Guardian ran a story on it)

Produce electric cars and ships + renewable energy for that amount and I bet you just a fraction dies from air pollution (and our climatic future would be on a much better trajectory)

Of course that's never going to happen, but if humanity had chosen to be wiser we could have..

Lets crunch some numbers (for entertainments sake..)

Lets say 3,53 million die of covid (150% todays number) and lets say cost of covid is $ 35.3 trillion.

If we've saved as many as have died through mitigation (not totally unreasonable estimate), that means the cost of every covid death is $ 1 mill...

I realize I am just playing with numbers, from the official covid tracker 2,8 million covid deaths (and maybe the later $28 trillion covid cost estimate is better too?) is probably just as good a guess... (well, it would still be... $1 mill).

Lower the deaths (plausible if covid deaths have been better registered than I anticipate and the vaccine is distributed faster than I anticipate) and the cost increases even more...

Now: Shall we look at the cost of ending hunger in Yemen? (20 million currently in serious hunger)?

I could do endless calculations that shows that every covid life is prices at a (ridiculous) premium of almost any other preventable life you can conjure up.

I agree that the IFR was probably close 1% in the beginning and is probably well under half that now.

Now, mathematics: Covid has exponential growth.. in a finite population.

That would give an S-curve and highly highly unlikely to run trough the population in 3 months with the R (about 2,5) that's been guesstimated for covid.

In fact, new studies from Italy find covid-19 in samples from september last year. It spread without any hinderance for more than 6 months until it reached levels where they even became aware. In retrospect it looks like they had a spike of pneumonia deaths several months prior to when the covid alarm was sounded. Just mentioning it as 3 months to rush through a population seem very short.

If for some reason you had let it run through the population in March (I don't think you attached march on to your first prediction, but heck) I have no doubt you'd end up seeing 1% because of the overwhelmed hospitals and stuff. (I seriously doubt 2 at any rate, but neither you or I know the answer to that)

What I know is that the numbers you refer to from Wuhan and Bergamo was in a situation where not even a fraction of the real number of positives where found. If lucky they found maybe 10% of all positives in Lombardy.

And even Lead foil is arguing for NO mitigation what so ever is he? (or have I missed that part)

Advice is mitigation. Voluntary social distancing, mandatory mask usage is mitigation, and then you go up the scale until you weld doors shut in Wuhan..

Sweden most definately have mitigated this crisis. And, per their goals (platta kurven) they have done fine so far, and lets see how they handle this latest surge before we pass verdict on how they've done in total.

Could be they stand the test of time nicely because they haven't had measures that have killed of organized sports, killed of businesses, and left underpriveliged kids to fend for themselves (++++) to the degree many other countries have.

And for the record, I am not against mitigation, not even lockdowns (to a certain degree)

I even completely understand the overreaction, but overreactions are per definition somewhat irrational, hence the overvaulation on covid deaths and forgetting there is basic human rights (like taking away your right to invite your neighbor over for a coffee).

Don't know why the overvaluation of covid deaths (relative to other deaths) is difficult for lockdownfans to admit?

Lets crunch some numbers (for entertainments sake..)

Lets say 3,53 million die of covid (150% todays number) and lets say cost of covid is $ 35.3 trillion.

If we've saved as many as have died through mitigation (not totally unreasonable estimate), that means the cost of every covid death is $ 1 mill...

I realize I am just playing with numbers, from the official covid tracker 2,8 million covid deaths (and maybe the later $28 trillion covid cost estimate is better too?) is probably just as good a guess... (well, it would still be... $1 mill).

Lower the deaths (plausible if covid deaths have been better registered than I anticipate and the vaccine is distributed faster than I anticipate) and the cost increases even more...

?

Haha.. I am bad at crunching numbers...

35.3 trillon / 3.53 million, isn't that infact $10 mill and not 1?

Guess my brain couldn't fathom that it might actually be as high as $10 million per death (and those deaths are already highly inflated numbers)...

Oh well.... anyways: Not overvalued. Got it.

Most interventions in the developed world cost far more than ones in the developing world. This is not really a great argument for COVID alone, per se, unless you want to argue that modern medicine is worthless because you can save lives for less giving bed nets to children in tropical countries.

These stories come out every few months and are usually proven wrong or highly suspect. From numbers alone it is very hard to make sense of. How could a virus with an R_t > 2.5 slowly spread for months before exploding at roughly the same time all over the world. The far more likely explanation is the researchers have bad antibody tests, etc, and that the virus took the accepted route of Dec China, Jan-Feb, Europe, March, everywhere.

Sweden is seeing huge growth in ICU admissions and deaths. They seem to be on the same footing as many countries (and worse than their neighbors): bad economy, lots of death, herd immunity nowhere to be seen.

Funny how you pick out paragraphs but fail to comment on others and forget completely to comment on my overriding point which is covid deaths are at a premium of other lifes...

I agree completely that deaths in 3rd world countries are very cheap, but the same exercise could be done for western preventable causes of death too... I just picked out hunger deaths which can be mitigated for a fraction of a fraction of the cost of covid to be very obvious...

air pollution, traffic deaths, MS deaths, heck even cancer is cheap as feck compared to the $10million estimate.

I agree that the findings from italy was surprising, but not sure if I would discount it just yet, it's been referred to by every major news outlet in the world and is part of a very serious cancer study.

At any rate, the fact that south Dakota hasn't taken any mitigating actions, yet 10 months+ on from the oubreak still less than 0,1% of the population is dead is perhaps better suited to counter the argument that it would run through the population in 3 months?

Thanks for updating me on the situation in Sweden. It's almost as you for some reason haven't read this thread and haven't recognized that I am very familiar with the situation in Sweden.

Can we agree on that Sweden have until this last surge done fine in doing what it said it would do which was to flatten the curve so that their hospitals weren't overrun?

Thank you, I thought so.

I am fully aware and have argued several times in this thread that if deaths compared to their neigbors is the mark which you want to measure Sweden against, they have done badly.

What people tend to forget is that some time last march Sweden diverged from Norway, Denmark & Finland in what their target for handling Covid was going to be. Sweden sticked to not overwhelming hospitals while the others pretty much decided they'd try and keep covid deaths as close to 0 as possible (at almost any cost)

I really have just one question to you Harambe:

Can you agree that we as a society seem to value avoiding covid deaths higher than avoiding other deaths?

If not, please show me the reason with calculation as to why not.

I am not even saying that it's wrong that humanity has found out that a covid life is bordering on priceless in value, I'm just saying that math shows us it is in fact overvalued given the cost of the measures we take to prevent them.

Being vegetarian and all, I actually quite like the new found value for human life and I certainly hope it spills over to other type of preventable deaths...

But that's a different debate all together.. :)

I do appreciate your posts -- you're one of the more rational folks here. It's hard for me to switch off the "dealing with trolls" mode.

A few thoughts

1) I think your analysis supposes that costs of mitigation are independent from the virus. If we let the virus run unabated from the beginning we would surely see economic disaster as well. I don't think you get all of the $35 trillion back (or even most of it!). To say things a different way, I don't think the $35 trillion or whatever is purely a result of mitigation -- a lot of that is a result of the pandemic!

2) I think with the risk from the convexity of a viral infection curve we aren't valuing life more than we would value any other life in a developed country, for the most part. Kinda grim to have to put that qualifier on it but yeah.

3) South Dakota, as many have pointed out, is extremely rural so I'm not surprised the has moved relatively slowly there. Add in seasonal effects and you're right that 3 months might be an underestimate but it's not totally material to the conversation I'd contend. The USA has seen way less travel and mobility in general, especially during the first wave, so it's not that surprising that we didn't see a lot of outbreak seeding in SD. Now that it's winter there and not April, things are taking off.

4) I still 100% don't buy any fall 2019 COVID story. The math just can't work out. Look at how hard it hit Wuhan basically as soon as it emerged. If it was circulating the whole world before that, why didn't it break out somewhere else first? You can't fit any sort of reasonable viral growth curve to such timelines.

5) We can agree on Sweden in the sense that we can agree on NYC. They had a disastrous first wave but then got things under control. Remains to be seen what happens but I'm not optimistic.

Oh wow. The covid cult still trying to convince each other the world is ending. What a motley crew. This is absolutely hilarious. And sad at the same time. I feel really bad for these people. Devoting so much time for nothing and could be doing something more constructive, like going out there and investigating the people who are responsible for the lockdowns.

A much more sensible answer Harambe! IThanks!

On 1): That's true (some of the costs we got just because of covid)

Yet, even if mitigation costs were only 20% of that number (a conservative estimate, I suspect it's higher), you'd find the value of covid lifes being valued at a premium of most if not all preventable deaths.

On 2) Can't understand how you reach that conclusion.. We know the risks for the different age brackets, we know the number of people on earth, just because this curve is convex in nature you can't measure it? I'd agree that to some extent the cost of covid lifes is a "think of a number" game, but we also know much of the data. The cost of covid can certainly be calculated. The number of deaths too.. The number of lives saved is even picked up by different models. You might not agree with $10m a life (which was a very simple analysis and can easily be disagreed with), but however you put it the cost of covid lifes are huge...

3) I agree with all of this.. but even in the "run through country unmigitated" scenario people will adapt (mitigate if you will) in order to avoid it, thus it will probably take considerably longer than 3 months no matter the scenario we face with seasons/travel/weather...

4) I am as puzzled as you are by the Italy study..

It COULD in theory mean that it originated in Italy, travelled to Wuhan and back for instance? (There is more travel between Lombardy and Wuhan than you'd expect because of the clothing industry).. Also: There has been noted that there was a spike in pneumonia in Lombardy prior..

I am going to wait on further knowledge on that very new study with huge implications for the Covid-19 timeline before I make up my mind too much on what it means, but on the surface of things it could mean that it was in Italy 6 months prior..

However you look at it though, the virus has no doubt taken it's time to reach serious levels in much of rural USA. Way longer than 3 months and with little or no mitigation other than people being aware it's a virus going around in many states.

5) You need to bring New York into it? Haha.. Ok..

Sweden took the first wave with far less pressure on the health system and only 1/3 of the casualties per capita.

That said, I'm not saying New York didn't handle it well considering Trump, the country they're in and that they found themselves in a Bergamo situation from one day to the next.

More importantly for me though when it comes to Sweden is that they handled the situation as planned. No politicising, no panicking politicians, but relying on experts and following their advice.

The obvious missed chance for Sweden was not doing the testing and tracing harder in the summer when their numbers was low and manegable, had they done it they'd have fared better.

In conclusion: I understand that you don't agree with covid lifes being at a premium of other lifes, but never the less I have no problems giving Mr. Lead Foil that bone.

We'll just have to agree to disagree I guess, but I think that my reason for reaching that conclusion is founded on actual numbers, so at least there's that.

If anyone can produce mathematics that would convince me otherwise I'll happily be convinced.

Interestingly under certain circumstances in the United States a life is valued at ...$10,000,000– often to do with insurance. I find this odd, because a life year is usually valued at slightly more than $100,000. Unless you figure the average person has close to another hundred years to live, those two numbers are inconsistent. Now, I tend to think that life years should be the way we Evaluate interventions as opposed to lives, but that doesn’t seem to be the way our system has been working lately. Given that all the data I have seen coming from the scientific literature suggests approximately 10 life years lost per coronavirus death. I think that any calculation using life years consistently would tend to see coronavirus interventions less favorably than one evaluating based on lives lost

Harambe wrote:

https://adamaltmejd.se/covid/

Sweden already at 50% of its first wave peak?!?

Really well done graphic showing the effect of Sweden's back dated reporting system as explained by KaareV upthread. Thanks for posting.

All of the above said: I am very much in favor of mitigiation in the form of advice, local lockdowns when neccecary and mask mandates when neccecary, but that doesn't mean I don't see problems with how these lockdowns are handled, because I am very much against those mandates being so harsh that they overrule human rights unneccecarily.

In Denmark you have had disabled people being fined for waiting on a bus in a "forbidden zone".

15 million minks were exterminated (initially even lacking the legal basis to do so)

In certain areas of Norway it's now illegal for a family of 5 to have their old neighbor over for a cup of coffee even if there is no spread to talk of in some of these counties.

Any criticism of those rules are being met with: "Shut up, be loyal and do what your government say, we can complain when it's over..."[/quote]

Budda, you are well informed and it is interesting to read you. Learn a lot. But when you write that in ceratin areas in Norway it is ILLEGAL for a family of 5 to have their neighbor over for a cup coffee. Actually, that is not true. But it is ILLEGAL to have private gatherings with over 10. And the picture you paint of Norway is a bit biased. The early lockdown was done in a kind of panic, but not to protect the elderly from dying at all costs. It was done, first of all, because the Norwegian Government was afraid that the hospitals din not have enough ICU-beds. i was't even a hard lockdown. Could still go the shops, though some businesses were locked down; dentists and hairdressers, and some restaurants, but after 6 1/2 weeks back to "normal" again., though with some restrictions. I am 71 with an "pretty serious "underlying condition; but I have lived a pretty normal life. Going, .i.e. walking, to the grocery shops, cut my hair once at home, met friends, having people visting us at all times, last time at dinner at restaurant four weeks ago. But they don't serve wine anymore, so there is no point any longer. And for Gods sake I don't wear a mask outdoors. No scientific evidence. And when you write that criticism of the rules are being met with "Shut up, be loyal and do what your goverment say" that is a big, big, exaggeration, beacuse it isn't close to be true. Why you wrote that I don't know, but you might know. In Sweden even at Goverment level Norway has been criticed for the closing of the borders to Sweden. And there has been strong criticism from a lot of Norwegians too. But in my opinion it was a decision.

A sound decision.

Here we go on LIVE with the Swedish covid 19 situation! No alcohol after 22 pm at pubs and restaurants !We went from 61 to 19 deaths in two days .We are of course hit by the second wave as everybody else, but the vaccins give good hope and promise with 95% effective protection. Only allowed with 8 persons gathered after 24 th November. Now we just wait fot the vaccin to be delivered!

So the long-term context is that 2020 is no worse than many other flu years for Sweden:

https://twitter.com/FatEmperor/status/1330173342754758658/photo/3

But context is not the strong suite of covidophobes.

8 out of 10 people that die in covid 19 is still age + 70 in Sweden.

Harambe wrote:

https://adamaltmejd.se/covid/

Sweden already at 50% of its first wave peak?!?

Not even close

Harambe wrote:

https://adamaltmejd.se/covid/

Sweden already at 50% of its first wave peak?!?

Sweden was #8 in deaths per 1M about 4 weeks ago. Now it’s down to 23rd. It may not be in the top 40 by the end of the year.