SBP supports Sweden’s well-considered approach, which is a replica of what we have been long recommending.
Sweden isolates its elderly and those with serious pre-conditions. It keeps primary schools open since this virus has virtually no effect on little children, and children are therefore the first to help society acquire herd immunity. Sweden also insists on reasonable social distancing but people are not required to wear masks, which allows the slow and sustained spread of the virus to less vulnerable groups.
Does this mean the Swedish model is perfect? No. Despite its best efforts, there will inevitably be a large number of deaths in the early stages of this approach. And it is almost certain that in the coming days Sweden will need to tighten its restrictions to prevent the overflow of ICUs.
But that’s manageable. Sweden is blessed to have one of the brightest officials in the world at its helm, Anders Tegnell. He has explained to the people of Sweden that there is no easy answer to this problem. They have understood that they have to take responsibility for themselves and their own families. The elderly have to be protected by each family. There is only so much that any government can do.
But once the elderly are safely cocooned, the remaining people are able to operate at a level of normalcy. This normalcy is, of course, quite different from regular normalcy. It includes working from home where possible, and so on. This is exactly what our party recommended on 6 March 2020.
There are strong early signs that Sweden is succeeding in a big way.
On 8 April 2020 Tegnell reported that Stockholm may have reached “more of a plateau situation than before”. In particular, “Stockholm is reaching a point where the basic reproduction number of the virus is 1.0, or in other words when one person infects on average only one other person”. That is a supreme achievement, given this virus generally infects over 2.5 persons in the initial stages.
This brilliant approach is going to help Sweden rapidly get over the peak of the pandemic with a growing wall of immune Swedes blocking the virus. In just a few weeks from now, Sweden will have defeated the virus; it would have passed like a bad flu season. Sweden’s economy will get a small one-off hit and then rapidly recover – while the rest of the world goes into deep Depression and most developing country economies (particularly India’s, with its worst-possible policies) collapse.
Most nations are behaving like ostriches with their head buried in sand – with febrile dreams about vaccines and treatments. They want to keep their society in suspended animation while reducing the loss of life from the virus. They are oblivious to the incomprehensible cost their society will pay for indefinite lockdowns. Steve Kates, an economist I admire, has estimated that the cost to society of saving a life in extreme, extended lockdowns could be in the range of $300 million. Good luck to Western nations with that.
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