Tough to make any sense of the world around us right now...and I'm thankful actually to have the many threads here to read and participate in if I can. Lots of different opinions here for sure, it's quite the wild ride reading some of these threads.
The Nordic Model
- Thread starter Insidious Von
- Start date
It is very important to note the numbers, the total number of cases, the new daily cases, the total number of deaths as well as the daily deaths are represent relevant information which determines the downward trend of the numbers as well provides useful information on how to combat the virus and be successful at it.
It is also very important to compare apples to apples even at this point when both have taken different measures to fight the spread of the Coronavirus. as both of these measures or non measures taken provides useful information on how to combat the virus properly.
Will any of these be the final outcome or numbers regarding the virus? more than likely not but it is all relevant at the current time.
To ignore and simply avoid these numbers as as the evidence they represent on how to combat the Coronavirus is ignorance. The most important issue with the Coronavirus is asymptomatic carriers and a country can not simply let businesses to operate as normal and think they can somehow curb the spread of the virus.
As I've said numerous times Sweden is at a point that their healthcare system is close to being overburdened with cases.
Thankfully their Prime Minister is aware of that and knows at some point he might have no other option but to institute strict measures to combat the virus which is exactly what I have been saying.
"Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven has admitted that the lax approach meant that “we will have significantly more deaths,” and the country may shift toward stricter measures."
That is your personal opinion and not representative of the facts.
Although today Sweden is ahead in the pandemic curve than today's Denmark or Norway all of these countries originally saw the first cases of the Coronavirus in the same timeline to one another, the main difference is that Denmark and Norway both used strict measures to combat the spread of the virus meanwhile Sweden did nothing which is both representative of the numbers each nation has in confirmed cases and deaths.
So when comparing Sweden today to Denmark or Norway today in the fight against the Coronavirus it is absolutely a fair comparison.
Cripes, the minute people start discussing "Acceptable death rates" I stop engaging.
The answer is zero. That is the basis of a liberal democracy. Individuals count. Every damn one.
The answer is zero. That is the basis of a liberal democracy. Individuals count. Every damn one.
But the fact that "Sweden is ahead in the pandemic curve" is the key fact that makes comparison of up-to-day infections and death rate irrelevant. Instead, it implies that we need to compare Denmark today with Sweden 2-3 weeks ago, No one disputing the fact that today's Sweden has more per-capita infection and death rate, but the interpretation of these facts is what is important. This number cannot be compared without the adjustment for the curve shift. Otherwise, it would be the same as comparing $1000 today and 100 years ago without adjusting for inflation.
Philosophically, this is true, but it isn`t realistic.
When restrictions lift, the virus will spread and some people will die.
This is inevitable.
It is impossible to save everybody.
The reality is that the economy has to open soon, within a few months, or the cure could be far worse than the virus.
If we wait for a vaccine, the economic depression will kill way more than this virus ever could even if everybody got infected.
A lot of people only have 2 more CERB payments coming and could be in for a rude awakening to the devastating reality that we are already facing.
I fully understand your issue with the death rate, I am certainly not saying the death rate or more proper term is the "fatality rate" will stay what we currently have for countries or overall to what it will be at the end.
I actually believe for many countries it will be significantly lower than what it is right now. The very high majority of health professionals think the death rate of the Coronavirus will be somewhere between 1%-2.5% which makes it 10-25X more deadlier than the flu.
In terms of testing it is no different than how testing for SARS, MERS virus has been done, one has to have show symptoms for the tests to be administered. Not all countries will be like Germany who can allocate $600Bln just for testing against the Coronvirus and not all nations can pull that off since they probably don't have the proper healthcare resources to do that.
Thankfully we live in Canada which took drastic measures and pretty quickly, as long as the citizens which the very high majority abide by these measures in the long run we will fair much betther than the very high majority of other countries, and that is including our immediate neighbours down south.
You fail to recognize the reason why Sweden is at a different point today than when they first were with Denmark and Norway is because of their own lack of actions in comparison to the other two countries. Yet somehow you are trying to excuse their inactions in the fight against the Coronavirus and label it as a successful model to emulate.
Sweden, Denmark and Norway were all at the same point within days of one another Sweden had 1 confirmed case on February 25th and February 27th was the first case for Denmark and Norway.
In that same timeline Sweden has accumulated 2X more confirmed cases than both Denmark and Norway, has 6X more deaths than Denmark and almost 11X more deaths than Norway and all of those are based solely on the fact that they didn't close businesses. Which in comparison to those two is an utter failure.
It's just irrational to view what they have done as a success meanwhile the facts prove otherwise and simply ignorant to say comparing them to one another is not possible since they are now at a different point in the fight against the Coronavirus than when they all started out together.
Thankfully the Swedish Prime Minister has realized the error in his decision and understands he might have to change his tune in the fight against the Coronavirus.
"Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven has admitted that the lax approach meant that “we will have significantly more deaths,” and the country may shift toward stricter measures."
Thanks DS99. I have mostly been a reader (like many others) of these threads as there is so much to understand and try to keep up with.
While April was a life changing time for all of us...I suspect/fear May is going to be even more so for both all of us locally here together in Ontario/Canada and watching what is about to happen south of the border.
I think you do not understand my point. Yes, they start at the same time with the same initial condition, but things progress much faster in Sweden. In other words, time flies faster in Sweden, so, now they are 2-3 weeks ahead in the curve. remember, that while we are flattering the curve,we, effectively SLOWER the progression of the virus, i.e., making the time to go slower. This is why current situation in Norway should be compared to situation in Sweden 2 weeks ago. To make it visual, take two condom, put them side by side, fix one point of them, put a mark in the middle of both of them, then stretch one of them, The stretched one is us, the unstretched is Sweden. The amount of rubber in each linear millimetre is the percentage of infected.
And it is not "lack of action" it is taking "appropriate" vs. "excessive" actions.
The advantage Sweden may have now is more people (than Norway & Denmark) infected & recovered with immunity. So when Denmark & Norway open up & let their imprisoned at home healthy people out, they will be exposed to the virus & many more may become sick & die than in Sweden. So while Sweden is having more deaths now, the other 2 countries will probably have more deaths later & may catch up to Sweden in number of deaths.
There is no consensus on whether immunity actually develops to Covid-19, or if it does, whether it lasts more than a few weeks.
Think about that.
Finally I can agree with you. :thumb:
Even when these countries do open up again, they will not return to normal volumes any time soon, plus this is happening at the time of typical seasonal virus dissipation.
Much more time is needed for a fair comparison.
This is a big concern, but typically the default thinking is that anti-bodies do equal immunity, until proven otherwise, especially for the numerous asymptomatic cases.
Recovered, almost: China's early patients unable to shed coronavirus
Why, he asked, did tests say he still had the virus more than two months after he first contracted it?
The answer to that question is a mystery baffling doctors on the frontline of China's battle against COVID-19, even as it has successfully slowed the spread of the coronavirus across the country.
Chinese doctors in Wuhan, where the virus first emerged in December, say a growing number of cases in which people recover from the virus, but continue to test positive without showing symptoms, is one of their biggest challenges as the country moves into a new phase of its containment battle.
Those patients all tested negative for the virus at some point after recovering, but then tested positive again, some up to 70 days later, the doctors said. Many have done so over 50-60 days.
The prospect of people remaining positive for the virus, and therefore potentially infectious, is of international concern, as many countries seek to end lockdowns and resume economic activity as the spread of the virus slows. Currently, the globally recommended isolation period after exposure is 14 days.
In South Korea, about 1,000 people have been testing positive for four weeks or more. In Italy, the first European country ravaged by the pandemic, health officials noticed that coronavirus patients could test positive for the virus for about a month.
As there is limited knowledge available on how infectious these patients are, doctors in Wuhan are keeping them isolated for longer.
It's a noble notion and it works in theory but cannot be applied completely in the real world.
"Two books I read around that time [9/11] were Schneier on Security - Schneier, and (I think) The gift of fear - De Becker, with honorable mention to Freakonomics.
Schneier goes on that there is simply no way to get to 100% in anything, there is always a trade off, and due to the laws of diminishing returns, and decreased marginal utility, you quickly approach a point in any endeavor where the resources deployed in whatever venture can be much better deployed elsewhere. He talks about 9/11. Simply locking cockpit doors, a quick, easy, cheap solution likely would have saved thousands of lives on 9/11. The easy 80% result, with 20% action from Pareto principle. Low hanging fruit. But for the petrified public that's not good enough. They want 0 deaths. So the next few hundred will take deployment of military at airports, 5x the security, a paranoid public adopting "if you see something say something" and the police resources that go with that to investigate busybody's reports of flashing pylons. That likely saved a few more, but at a literal cost of billions."
Most folks on TERB and perhaps the general public are at the stage of "save every last life at all cost". In retrospect you'll understand how foolish this is, but in the midst of it, you're all caught up in emotions and will actively make life worse and cause more deaths believing you're taking the high road.
"The no free lunch principle. If you wanted to say, eliminate tub deaths, you could just ban showers. But then what? People would bath in lakes or the ocean - increasing drownings. Or they may not bathe at all, decreasing hygiene and increasing disease. So now you have no tub deaths, but many more deaths overall from people getting (or not) clean. He said one of the biggest tragedies to come about from 9/11 was increased flight costs. Reason being that for marginal cases who were on the cusp of affording to fly, could no longer. They drive, and more people on the roads equate to more deaths.
Freakonomics and Fear just for the human psychology/numbers aspect of it. People are horrible with numbers and stats. A 1/100 risk (lifetime odds of dying in a car crash) to most people is the same as a 1/billion risk. Most people just call it 0. Conversely, when terrorism or the virus is on the front page of every paper, ppl take the opposite approach. The risk in their mind is close to certain, which is why you see something like 2/3rd of people convinced they're going to catch, and probably die from this virus.
The whole point is that most people are irrational and unthinking, and want to demand certainty. But in order to get from 2 deaths in Canada to 1 for whatever cause, it will likely take a similar amount of resources as getting from 2 million to 1 million. Since resources are limited, you must pick and choose where they're deployed to do the most overall good. The ability to shut down huge swaths of the economy is a resource like any other, and if they wanted to, they could likely lower deaths further by banning being outside, and forbidding more than once monthly grocery shopping, along with only 4 hours a day of power to minimize workers at the plants. Where you draw the line is arbitrary, but it must be balanced both in costs and benefits, and I feel, particularly in light of the virus not being nearly as bad as predicted, that we've not just overstepped the line, but driven a race car past it."
Freakonomics and Fear just for the human psychology/numbers aspect of it. People are horrible with numbers and stats. A 1/100 risk (lifetime odds of dying in a car crash) to most people is the same as a 1/billion risk. Most people just call it 0. Conversely, when terrorism or the virus is on the front page of every paper, ppl take the opposite approach. The risk in their mind is close to certain, which is why you see something like 2/3rd of people convinced they're going to catch, and probably die from this virus.
The whole point is that most people are irrational and unthinking, and want to demand certainty. But in order to get from 2 deaths in Canada to 1 for whatever cause, it will likely take a similar amount of resources as getting from 2 million to 1 million. Since resources are limited, you must pick and choose where they're deployed to do the most overall good. The ability to shut down huge swaths of the economy is a resource like any other, and if they wanted to, they could likely lower deaths further by banning being outside, and forbidding more than once monthly grocery shopping, along with only 4 hours a day of power to minimize workers at the plants. Where you draw the line is arbitrary, but it must be balanced both in costs and benefits, and I feel, particularly in light of the virus not being nearly as bad as predicted, that we've not just overstepped the line, but driven a race car past it."
The most important two facts about the virus is it's highly contagious, and asymptomatic carriers can have the virus for weeks without knowing they carry the virus, potentially spreading the virus to others unknowingly.
What Sweden has decided to do which is to keep businesses open as usual unnecessarily including restaurants, bars, resorts, schools, cafes and gyms will have a significant higher effect on the number of confirmed cases, number of deaths as well as the death rate in that country compared to those countries who enforced strict quarantine/isolation measures and until Sweden changes the way they fight the Coronavirus by enforcing quarantines these numbers will be higher.
Many professional healthcare people predicted this was going to happen in Sweden but unfortunately the ignorant, loud and irrational few people (usually right wing nut bars) who are in favour of unnecessarily opening businesses back up and doing it quickly questioned these thought out and educated estimations with false facts and misleading information. These people are still oblivious to the numbers and facts, trying to paint Sweden as a success which is the exact opposite of what is true, and trying to tell us Canadians to emulate what Sweden did all in an attempt to open businesses. Which would be the wrong thing to do.
Now another fact that is important on the trend and numbers regarding the Coronavirus is that roughly 3% of all the people who contract the Coronavirus will need critical care in hospitals. Right now as it stands Sweden is extremely close to overburdening their healthcare system due to the number of critical care cases and if that happens they will see a bigger spike than they currently have in the numbers of deaths and the death rate. Which is something that could have been avoided had they taken the proper measures to self isolate/mass quarantines.
The spike in numbers we see in the last few days in Sweden 545, 682 and 751 (single day high) today in new confirmed cases, with 185 (single day high), 172 and 84 today in new daily deaths is due to the spike in numbers from April 7-9, was predicted by some and could have been predicted by others had they chose to understood the numbers, facts and trends. Some posters after April 12th were touting Sweden as a success and comparing it to the UK, Belgium and Italy meanwhile Sweden compared to its immediate neighbours Denmark and Norway who all originally saw the spread of the virus in the same timeframe is fairing far worse. I told people that Sweden will have higher numbers around the 20th of the month but almost all questioned the numbers, facts and trends as something they could not forsee.
There will be a 14 day timeframe with this virus and the data has shown us exactly just that over and over again.
Thing to note was that Sweden's death rate on April 10th was a lot lower at 8.9% compared to today where the current death rate is 12.1% and it will keep on going higher in the next few days. Some would say the death rate is not relevant and has no bearing or importance on what is happening, why would the death rate be relevant?
Because the data from other countries has shown us that is what happens. It's because in all the countries that have had the Coronavirus and there has been a surge or a constant increase in the number of confirmed new cases like there currently is in Sweden the death rate has gone up and only stopped going up when there were measures put into place (quarantines) to curb the virus.
Now all of this is important because it goes back to the importance of quarantines/social distancing and the direct correlation it has with the confirmed cases and deaths.
Sadly what is happening in Sweden will not slow down until the government enforces mass quarantines/self isolation and their confirmed cases and deaths could have been kept to a smaller number. Regardless of what some irrational, loud or ignorant nut bars say otherwise as unknown or unforseen.
This notion that Sweden is handling the fight against the Coronaviurs a lot better than other countries was nothing more than a lie and a farce in an attempt to open businesses up.
All these numbers and facts are there for people to see and use but some want to label these numbers and facts as irrelevant or too early to use, but in reality these are the only things that need to be used to determine policies against the Coronavirus.
The relevance of those countries starting at the same time, and instituting different measures drastic from Sweden in the fight against the Coronavirus proves that keeping business as usual without other strict measures of quarantines/social distancing and health measures will not help to properly fight this virus. Which is what you fail to understand.
To label what Sweden is doing as "appropriate" compared to others Denmark, and Norway and subsequently label that "excessive" who are fairing far better than Sweden within the same timeline shows how irrational and oblivious to the facts you are.
Even if you compared Sweden from 2-3 weeks ago to Denmark and Norway today which would be an irrational argument and comparison to make (since they all started in the same timeline)
I can assure that both Denmark and Norway today are fairing far better than Sweden 2-3 weeks ago. Here are the numbers.
-----------------------Sweden------------------------------------------Denmark------------------------------------------Norway----
April 2nd------------5568 cases, 308 deaths, rate 5.5%---------3386 cases, 123 deaths, 3.6% rate----------5147 cases, 50 deaths, 1.0% death rate
April 9th-------------9141 cases,793 deaths, rate 8.7%---------5635 cases, 237 deaths, 4.2% rate-----------6219 cases, 108 deaths, 1.7% death rate
Unfortunately some people like yourself who lack critical thinking and any knowledge of the facts and numbers revolving the Coronavirus will make any sort of non factual or false point they can in an attempt to show the failure of Sweden as a success which again facts continually prove otherwise.
I consider myself "right leaning", but in this discussion it only makes sense to shut down some capitalism with a very reasonable expectation of saving lives.
OK, try the "stretch the condom" experiment at home to see that even if both condoms start at the same place, the stretch condom has less rubber per linear foot, they both weight the same. After that, revisit the "time stretch" argument. Finally, note that 7 days is not 2-3 weeks.
