Sweden avoiding lockdown

biko

https://www.svt.se/nyheter/lokalt/vast/ytterligare-svenskt-dodsfall-efter-astra-vaccination-utreds

Sweden's 2nd death with AZ vaccine and 4th with major side effects. Healthy 70yo woman.

The woman, who was completely healthy, was vaccinated with Astra Zeneca's vaccine two weeks ago. She later suffered from both blood clots and low levels of platelets and was first cared for in the intensive care unit. Last week she passed away.

For people who are 65 years or older, the Swedish Public Health Agency considers that the vaccine can still be recommended.

humberklog

Sweden's on much of a par with Ireland re vax. 28 doses per 100.

Interestingly Norway has said it's going to give Sweden and Iceland 220k AZ doses to help them along even though Norway has much the same roll out as Sweden.

Norway has had some issues with AZ.

j@utis

Why Sweden's covid data isn't available on here anymore?

DylanJM

Is that Google? Still showing for me. Looks like their cases 7 day avg is slowly falling again. Currently ~5,200 compared to ~6,200 two weeks ago.

humberklog

There's a very good episode out today from the Podcast "The Times- Story of our times" about Sweden and the last year. It's a re-visit episode from one back in...eh maybe May.

Hosted by Manveen Rana with Swedish investigative journo- Daniel Ohman.

He draws comparisons with UK and other badly performed EU countries but also Norway, Finland and Denmark and explains how restrictions in Sweden were implemented and how they were obeyed and disobeyed.

It's an easy listen. It's level-headed. Not dogmatic.

biko

In Kalmar region you will not know what vaccine you get - until you sit on the chair.
If you then decide to not get the vaccine you must pay 20 Euro.

So if you don't want AZ it's gonna cost you.

In theory you can get these fines forever if you keep trying to get vaccinated, but keep saying no to AZ.

https://www.svt.se/nyheter/lokalt/smaland/par-tackade-nej-till-vaccin-och-fick-betala-400-kronor-nu-jo-anmaler-de-regionen

humberklog

biko wrote: »

In Sweden you will not know what vaccine you get - until you sit on the chair.
If you then decide to not get the vaccine you must pay 20 Euro.

So if you don't want AZ it's gonna cost you.

In theory you can get these fines forever if you keep trying to get vaccinated, but keep saying no to AZ.

https://www.svt.se/nyheter/lokalt/smaland/par-tackade-nej-till-vaccin-och-fick-betala-400-kronor-nu-jo-anmaler-de-regionen

Jaysus, the Swedes are as odd as ****.

In fairness i know 6 over 70's in Ireland (my parents included) that got vaxed and they weren't told which one. They weren't interested either, it was only looking at the pamphlet they took home where it says which one they got.
6 in Ireland got Pfizer and onw has since died (she was recovering from cancer).
I know of 2 in Scotland got AZ, one died about 2 weeks after 2nd dose, (he had mild angina for a couple of years).

But I'm sure if they'd ask which vax they were getting they would've been told.



.

Boggles

humberklog wrote: »

In fairness i know 6 over 70's in Ireland (my parents included) that got vaxed and they weren't told which one.

TBF they didn't need to be, they got Pfizer.

charlie14

Boggles wrote: »

TBF they didn't need to be, they got Pfizer.

They would also have received a vaccination record that stated which vaccine along with the dates administered and the batch numbers.

humberklog

Boggles wrote: »

TBF they didn't need to be, they got Pfizer.

No they didn't need to be and nor did they think to ask.

All's well that ends well.

Boggles

humberklog wrote: »

No they didn't need to be and nor did they think to ask.

All's well that ends well.

Good for them.

The point being though you didn't have to ask or be told if you were in a certain cohort.

humberklog

Boggles wrote: »

Good for them.

The point being though you didn't have to ask or be told if you were in a certain cohort.

For me and in my experience it's good practice to keep the client informed.

"Today sir you'll be receiving your Pfiser vaccination."

Not too hard, might be over informing in particular as they're elderly Irish so Pfiser is the only option. But they're administering a branded injection, simple communication of information.
That's all, no biggy.

Foreigndad

Foreigndad wrote: »

Didn't know the page existed in English, thanks! If you click in below the chart there are more details

No idea but a guess would be obesity rates. Think obesity is more common amongs men than women, same in all of Scandinavia. Also in immigrant populations (which are more affected) males tend to work while women are home. Not sure if that would contribute though.

This has been well flagged from the beginning, men more vulnerable than women due to more ACE receptors. With the obsession in Ireland with cases, and female centric media where 1 woman = 100 men, this is often missed, as men die here at greater rates than women.

Deleted User

Deleted User wrote: »

Compared to Sweden, in absolute numbers Germany currently has 400% of the 7day rolling average of detections, and 1000% the 7 day rolling average of deaths. As Sweden lost far more of its vulnerable population (in terms of vulnerability to being infected e.g. institutional settings and in vulnerability to having a severe infection leading to death) in earlier waves, the disparity in detections-to-deaths between Sweden and Germany doesn't seem as wild as you portray it.


Netherlands has had ~56k cases in the last 7 days with 133 deaths.
Belgium has had ~24k cases in the last 7 days with 264 deaths
Sweden has had ~38k cases in the last 7 days with 140 deaths.


Why is it yet another person posting guff rather than doing a handful of google searches and engaging their brain?


*all stats from google's coronavirus info, not arsed spending more time on data that people will just ignore anyway because it doesn't suit their narrative

One problem with your stats, Belgium has been hammered in every wave so far. It certainly didn't escape earlier waves at all, despite stringent lockdowns. Has a very elderly population and lots of immigrants.

It makes sense for Germany though.

biko

How the death numbers are reported.
Can you see something odd about the graph?

jaykay74

biko wrote: »

In Sweden you will not know what vaccine you get - until you sit on the chair.
If you then decide to not get the vaccine you must pay 20 Euro.

So if you don't want AZ it's gonna cost you.

In theory you can get these fines forever if you keep trying to get vaccinated, but keep saying no to AZ.

https://www.svt.se/nyheter/lokalt/smaland/par-tackade-nej-till-vaccin-och-fick-betala-400-kronor-nu-jo-anmaler-de-regionen

The article says in Kalmar county for both the discovery of the vaccine type and the fine (unless I am mistaken?). So it is "In Sweden" as you say but you could get the idea from your statement that it is the totality of Sweden. I have no idea about the rest of Sweden (which covers most of the population). Just for clarity the population of Kalmar county is roughly 250k out of roughly 10m total population.

biko

You're right, the article says Kalmar.
I've updated the post.

humberklog

biko wrote: »

How the death numbers are reported.
Can you see something odd about the graph?

Give us a clue?

Bit cynical

biko wrote: »

How the death numbers are reported.
Can you see something odd about the graph?

Doesn't seem at the outset particularly unusual.

Only thing is that they've extended the vertical axis unnecessarily high, but this could be because they use the same chart settings for other EU countries many of whom, sadly, having higher deaths than Sweden.

biko

Yes, it's in the little details to make numbers appear lower.

Here a person have noted it over time, the Y axis increases.
The number never exceed 150 but Y axis jumps from 200, to 300, to 400 needlessly.

https://twitter.com/peterdalle/status/1363772027585314818?s=20

Bit cynical

biko wrote: »

Yes, it's in the little details to make numbers appear lower.

Here a person have noted it over time, the Y axis increases.
The number never exceed 150 but Y axis jumps from 200, to 300, to 400 needlessly.

Well to a certain extent that is understandable. As time goes on, the various peaks and troughs of the graph get compressed horizontally giving a misleading impression of the steepness of the slopes. Conseqently a rescaling of the vertical axis is necessary to keep things in proportion.

biko

If you wanted square rescaling then they'd need to push it up to 1000.
If you look at the image again it could easily be any Y axis, but they chose to increase it.
You can have a long x axis and a short y axis.

What's uncustomary is to have all measurements only at the bottom of the scale.
Just look at your own graphs.

PintOfView

Bit cynical wrote: »

Well to a certain extent that is understandable. As time goes on, the various peaks and troughs of the graph get compressed horizontally giving a misleading impression of the steepness of the slopes. Conseqently a rescaling of the vertical axis is necessary to keep things in proportion.

However to have a Y-axis scale that goes to 400,
when the highest Y value is less than 150,
could have the effect of making the numbers look more benign than they are!!

I take your point about the horizontal axis getting compressed as time goes on,
making slopes look steeper on a full scale Y axis.

A better way to present the information would be to have Y axis that went to 150 or 200,
but the width of the graph was much greater in relation to the height,
so a bit like their existing graph, but chop it at 200!

bb1234567

So after this ****show of a year, and every European country trying a cocktail of different failing measures, only two countries managed to avoid any large COVID outbreaks on the continent. Finland and Norway. Their COVID death rate really is so tiny, and the below average rate of mortality means this is also proven as accurate reporting. They both have deaths per capita nearly 10x times below the EU/UK average. So what was done there that was so special? The difference is much too stark to be chalked down to any natural anomally like demographic differences really it would seem.

Dr. Em

bb1234567 wrote: »

So after this ****show of a year, and every European country trying a cocktail of different failing measures, only two countries managed to avoid any large COVID outbreaks on the continent. Finland and Norway. Their COVID death rate really is so tiny, and the below average rate of mortality means this is also proven as accurate reporting. They both have deaths per capita nearly 10x times below the EU/UK average. So what was done there that was so special? The difference is much too stark to be chalked down to any natural anomally like demographic differences really it would seem.

I've spent quite a bit of time in Norway, and would guess at some of the reasons. Some are more obvious: low population density with geographically isolated populations in many parts of the country. Others are less obvious. Oslo has the public transportation system you would expect to find in a city of several million, not a city of 600k. Even in ordinary times it isn't packed. There is a long history of building 1-person apartments. Families have been smaller for longer. In Ireland, it wouldn't be unusual for someone in their fourties to be one of five siblings. You would have to go back another generation or two to see families of that size in Norway. It's harder to stick strictly to restrictions if it means not seeing family, and in Ireland most people simply have more family. Friend groups in Norway seem to be smaller - say 6 good friends that always go about together. That is practically a bubble. The weather is better in the summer and everyone spends far more time socializing outside, even in winter. Also, trust in the government is generally higher. A lot of these things would apply to Sweden as well and helped them when they took a light-touch approach. I think they have done reasonably well, a things considered, but because of some of the factors above, I don't think the same approach would have worked in Ireland.

Dr. Em

There is also an element of luck. Norway locked down fairly hard early on and then was able to open up for longer, which means that they didn't struggle as much with restriction fatigue. They had to lock down again in Jan/Feb and we might see more resistance to the restrictions if they continue for too long.

Dr. Em

Dr. Em wrote: »

I've spent quite a bit of time in Norway, and would guess at some of the reasons. Some are more obvious: low population density with geographically isolated populations in many parts of the country. Others are less obvious. Oslo has the public transportation system you would expect to find in a city of several million, not a city of 600k. Even in ordinary times it isn't packed. There is a long history of building 1-person apartments. Families have been smaller for longer. In Ireland, it wouldn't be unusual for someone in their fourties to be one of five siblings. You would have to go back another generation or two to see families of that size in Norway. It's harder to stick strictly to restrictions if it means not seeing family, and in Ireland most people simply have more family. Friend groups in Norway seem to be smaller - say 6 good friends that always go about together. That is practically a bubble. The weather is better in the summer and everyone spends far more time socializing outside, even in winter. Also, trust in the government is generally higher. A lot of these things would apply to Sweden as well and helped them when they took a light-touch approach. I think they have done reasonably well, a things considered, but because of some of the factors above, I don't think the same approach would have worked in Ireland.

1) I've posted before comparing the urban population %ages of Norway/Finland/Sweden and they're broadly similar - all three are significantly higher than Ireland's. Yes it's a broad and inaccurate proxy of actual settled population density, but it's certainly better than dividing a country's raw area by it's total population.

2) Oslo does not have the public transportation network of a city multiple times its size. Indeed, proportionate to metro area population, it's subway system (in length & number of stops) is less than that of Stockholm's. It's subway system is more developed than our DART & two luas lines, we have a more developed + high frequency bus network and commuter rail network.

3) Oslo's t-bane, trams and buses are routinely overflowing at peak time. Have you ever actually ridden on them during the rush hour? Jernbanetorget is a sea of people and even trying to find space on the platform to get on one of the t-bane's can be challenging, nevermind finding space on the actual train (or the buses)

4) I'm not sure about the "long history of building 1 bedroom apartments" - it certainly doesn't tally with my experience and while Oslo is certainly more apartment friendly than Dublin, it's still big on having mid-density suburban family homes unlike most European capitals I've been to. The ubiqitous apartment blocks from the 50s and 60s are overwhelmingly 2bed+, given they were built post-war to account for a rising urban population.

5) Average household size in Norway: 2.15. Average household size in Sweden: 2.17. Sweden also had the highest proportion of single person households in the EU, and higher than Norway: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/DDN-20170905-1


Norway's response fundamentally differed to Ireland's in several ways.

While we both locked down early, Norway invested in expanding testing & tracing from the very beginning. We didn't.

Norway learned from a handful of early outbreaks in hospitals and care facilities, we didn't and instead we had Tony Holohan et al gaslighting us and lying in public about how 'we couldn't have known' and 'there was nothing that could have been differently'.

Norway never had repeated outbreaks in the same areas that were swept under the rug and never meaningfully addressed (meat processing outbreaks were raised in the Dail at the end of April 2020 - they were one of the primary causes of the 2nd wave, and are still a regular occurrence this year).

Norway from the get-go took a graduated, regional approach to restrictions and communicated such effectively. Days after introducing our new 'levels'-based system we had already broken the system by adding new unspecified restrictions and creating shadow 'half' levels. We also gave up on regional restrictions pretty quickly as soon as they had an effect on Dublin, whereas Norway had Oslo (& occasionally it's environs) on higher levels than the rest of the country repeatedly - and still does.

Norway has been much stricter on international travel, coronavirus testing of travellers, and mandatory quarantine. While the British mutation escaped into the wild there anyway, its spread was much slower and never took a firm hold outside Oslo.

Norway hasn't suffered from lockdown fatigue because its leaders have engaged in clear and effective decision-making and communication. People here got fatigued by ineptitude, hmm-ing and haw-ing, farcicaly bad decision-making & comms, and politicians very obviously playing politics with restriction decisions. I'm not a fan of Erna Solberg, but when she broke the rules she owned up to it straight away and paid the penalty. That was the end of it. Here it turned into a scandal because politicians played politics with it - whether from castigating those who broke the rules for political advantage, or trying to protect those who broke the rules because of tribalism.


*I say all this as someone who has spent 4 months in Oslo in the last 3 years, including a week in March 2020 and 3 weeks in August 2020.

Bit cynical

Bit cynical wrote: »

Well to a certain extent that is understandable. As time goes on, the various peaks and troughs of the graph get compressed horizontally giving a misleading impression of the steepness of the slopes. Conseqently a rescaling of the vertical axis is necessary to keep things in proportion.

This is hilarious, as are the names of the likes on it.


As biko had already posted, the vertical maximum data point never increased (150) - yet here you are explaining that "a(n upward) rescaling of the vertical axis is necessary to keep things in proportion".


That's an incredible statement to make - you're basically admitting that you don't understand how a simple graph works.

Lumen

IMO the correct way to present that data is by stacking two graphs vertically, one showing the wave under discussion, and the second the whole range with the selected wave highlighted.

Both can use the same ratio between X and Y.

Dr. Em

[Deleted User] wrote: »

1) I've posted before comparing the urban population %ages of Norway/Finland/Sweden and they're broadly similar - all three are significantly higher than Ireland's. Yes it's a broad and inaccurate proxy of actual settled population density, but it's certainly better than dividing a country's raw area by it's total population.

2) Oslo does not have the public transportation network of a city multiple times its size. Indeed, proportionate to metro area population, it's subway system (in length & number of stops) is less than that of Stockholm's. It's subway system is more developed than our DART & two luas lines, we have a more developed + high frequency bus network and commuter rail network.

3) Oslo's t-bane, trams and buses are routinely overflowing at peak time. Have you ever actually ridden on them during the rush hour? Jernbanetorget is a sea of people and even trying to find space on the platform to get on one of the t-bane's can be challenging, nevermind finding space on the actual train (or the buses)

4) I'm not sure about the "long history of building 1 bedroom apartments" - it certainly doesn't tally with my experience and while Oslo is certainly more apartment friendly than Dublin, it's still big on having mid-density suburban family homes unlike most European capitals I've been to. The ubiqitous apartment blocks from the 50s and 60s are overwhelmingly 2bed+, given they were built post-war to account for a rising urban population.

5) Average household size in Norway: 2.15. Average household size in Sweden: 2.17. Sweden also had the highest proportion of single person households in the EU, and higher than Norway: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/DDN-20170905-1


Norway's response fundamentally differed to Ireland's in several ways.

While we both locked down early, Norway invested in expanding testing & tracing from the very beginning. We didn't.

Norway learned from a handful of early outbreaks in hospitals and care facilities, we didn't and instead we had Tony Holohan et al gaslighting us and lying in public about how 'we couldn't have known' and 'there was nothing that could have been differently'.

Norway never had repeated outbreaks in the same areas that were swept under the rug and never meaningfully addressed (meat processing outbreaks were raised in the Dail at the end of April 2020 - they were one of the primary causes of the 2nd wave, and are still a regular occurrence this year).

Norway from the get-go took a graduated, regional approach to restrictions and communicated such effectively. Days after introducing our new 'levels'-based system we had already broken the system by adding new unspecified restrictions and creating shadow 'half' levels. We also gave up on regional restrictions pretty quickly as soon as they had an effect on Dublin, whereas Norway had Oslo (& occasionally it's environs) on higher levels than the rest of the country repeatedly - and still does.

Norway has been much stricter on international travel, coronavirus testing of travellers, and mandatory quarantine. While the British mutation escaped into the wild there anyway, its spread was much slower and never took a firm hold outside Oslo.

Norway hasn't suffered from lockdown fatigue because its leaders have engaged in clear and effective decision-making and communication. People here got fatigued by ineptitude, hmm-ing and haw-ing, farcicaly bad decision-making & comms, and politicians very obviously playing politics with restriction decisions. I'm not a fan of Erna Solberg, but when she broke the rules she owned up to it straight away and paid the penalty. That was the end of it. Here it turned into a scandal because politicians played politics with it - whether from castigating those who broke the rules for political advantage, or trying to protect those who broke the rules because of tribalism.


*I say all this as someone who has spent 4 months in Oslo in the last 3 years, including a week in March 2020 and 3 weeks in August 2020.

Look, I'm not going to go through an answer point by point. We aren't exactly at cross purposes. My point is that Sweden would likely have had a similar rates to Norway if they had had the same restrictions. Sweden has done well in comparison to the rest of Europe without those restrictions due to a combination of societal factors, natural advantages, and not a small bit of luck. Ireland couldn't have copied their approach with the same results.

I do disagree with you about Oslo's public transportation system, but that may be hinging on the definition of 'crowded'. Yes, I have been on the T-bane at rush hour and struggling to find a seat for a stop or two in the city centre is nothing to watching three full buses go past in Finglas that don't even have standing room. With five underground lines with 15 min frequency, six tram lines, 13 commuter rail in addition to buses, commuter ferries, a bike system (summer), and an electric scooter system, Oslo has a lot of options and capacity for a city of 600k, not to mention that the city centre is walkable.