Posted on 04/23/2020 8:20:27 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Its neighbors closed borders, schools, bars and businesses as the coronavirus pandemic swept through Europe, but Sweden went against the grain by keeping public life as unrestricted as possible.
The strategy — aimed at allowing some exposure to the virus in order to build immunity among the general population while protecting high-risk groups like the elderly — has been controversial. Some health experts liken it to playing Russian roulette with public health.
But now, the country’s chief epidemiologist said the strategy appears to be working and that “herd immunity” could be reached in the capital Stockholm in a matter of weeks.
“In major parts of Sweden, around Stockholm, we have reached a plateau (in new cases) and we’re already seeing the effect of herd immunity and in a few weeks’ time we’ll see even more of the effects of that. And in the rest of the country, the situation is stable,” Dr. Anders Tegnell, chief epidemiologist at Sweden’s Public Health Agency, told CNBC on Tuesday.
Herd immunity among a population, usually achieved through vaccination, is reached when around 60% of citizens are deemed immune. Without a vaccine for the coronavirus, however, scientists are looking at whether exposure to and recovery from Covid-19 leads to long-term immunity. Reinfections of coronavirus have been reported.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnbc.com ...
A HUGE CAVEAT IN REGARDS TO SWEDEN:
While the number of new cases appears to be declining, achieving herd immunity has proved controversial. Tacitly allowing the virus to spread (albeit having put measures in place to slow its spread) puts the elderly and people with existing health conditions at a greater risk of becoming seriously ill and, potentially, dying.
Tegnell conceded that the situation in Sweden’s care homes, which have seen the majority of deaths from the coronavirus, is worrying.
“The death toll is very closely related to elderly care homes. More than half of the people that have died have lived in elderly care homes.” Tegnell said, adding that he and the Public Health Agency are “still very concerned about the elderly.”
“It’s the group we said we needed to protect,” he said, adding that the agency was working with homes to see what improvements could be made to lower risk factors.
There is only one thing on the minds of the democrats and the deep state: preventing Donald Trump’s reelection.
Whenever the press asks Trump anything about the coronavirus, what they’re really thinking inside is how to use fake news to stop normal voting.
Sweden took the right approach, many instinctively knew it but it was never going to happen here with a Republican President facing re-election.
What has S. Korea done to account for the nearly immediate and sustained flattening of the outbreak in that country?
It’s controversial because it is controversial? Great logic.
Herd immunity is the only way to protect the vulnerable. Isolate them until herd immunity is achieved at which time the virus will recede and it will be much safer for the vulnerable. It will never be completely safe for the vulnerable and they will continue to die from Corona and every other virus that gets loose in those hell holes.
Flattening the curve is dangerous for the vulnerable because it prolongs the lockdown isolation period. The quicker the herd gains immunity the better off for them.
Deaths per million population:
Belgium 560
Spain 474
Italy 415
France 327
UK 276
Netherlands 244
Sweden 200
USA 144
Luxembourg 128
Portugal 80
Monaco 76
Denmark 68
Germany 64
Austria 58
Canada 54
Norway 35
Finland 31
World 23.9
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/?utm_campaign=homeAdUOA?Si#countries
“Without a vaccine for the coronavirus, however, scientists are looking at whether exposure to and recovery from Covid-19 leads to long-term immunity.”
You either develop an immunity to it or it kills you. IOW, you either kill it or it kills you.
Without a vaccine or an antiviral drug, those are the only two possible results of the herd immunity strategy.
They should do it cases per million or something to correlate to national population as a whole.
Anybody else bothered by the term “herd (an animal term) immunity”? It seems every day we are being treated more and more like animals.....
It would be helpful if Sweden was in there somewhere.
It’s the lutefisk.
In practice, is the area under the “flattened” curve less than the unflattened one? I thought the argument was that the practice postponed the deaths, so that health systems would not be overwhelmed, but didn’t prevent them.
Sweden’s health system is not overwhelmed. So what I’d expect, from those models, is that their death rate would be higher than others at first, and then lower later.
Yet shutting down the entire economy creating a great depression to buy them a few more days or weeks might prove to be a mistake, if everyone will eventually get it.
The way this could work is only recovered COVID-19 people could interact with them.
I’m not bothered by the term. I find it useful to cause people to become enlightened that the people who govern them do, in fact, view the public as a herd.
Clinically, it’s a good term. From a health perspective, the world human population can be viewed as interconnected herds of animals.
I know God sees me as an individual, as do my family and friends. But I do not expect the government to accord that sort of respect.
Well - it won’t kill all of us, but I know what you mean. We’ll all get sick from it.
I was reading some site where the first time the medical expert was asked about herd immunity he thought it was a joke. He said you need to be able to vaccinate enough people too. But then I started looking into him more, and the “medical expert” was going for his P.hD. in some medical field, but it sounded more like a teaching gig. It seemed his claim to fame was a blog.
Regardless - I’m taking this whole “herd immunity” with a grain of salt. When I get some time I would like to learn how SARS and MERS went by the wayside.
“Tegnell conceded that the situation in Sweden’s care homes, which have seen the majority of deaths from the coronavirus, is worrying.”
That reality has NOTHING to do with Sweden’s approach; we’re seeing nursing homes and elder care facilities worldwide with epic death rates.
That has to do with the virus itself, not how you’re managing it’s spread.
The goal of social distancing was to ‘flatten the curve’ so our hospitals were not overrun, they are NOT overrun, and in many cases are ghost towns throughout the nation.
Time to put the drastic measures behind us deal with this disease as we have dealt with all disease before Covid-19.
Will people die? Yes, but far more will live and be enjoying their LIFE and building their futures!
>>>What has S. Korea done to account for the nearly immediate and sustained flattening of the outbreak in that country?
South Korea was very quick to test and then track those testing positive. We were slow to test and resitant to tracking.
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