[imagesource: Jonathan Nackstrand/AFP]

When the coronavirus went from infecting a few countries to a worldwide pandemic, it was interesting to see how different countries developed varying strategies to contain and manage it.

Leading the pack insofar as disaster management is concerned is New Zealand, which has been praised for its swift response to the pandemic, consisting of aggressive lockdown measures and travel bans paired with widespread testing and contract tracing.

They have, in effect, squashed the virus.

Then there’s Sweden.

The country decided to opt against lockdown early on, claiming that their primary focus would be sustaining the economy and allowing herd immunity to develop.

Many, frustrated with the lockdown regulations in their own countries, have pointed to Sweden as an example of how to correctly handle a pandemic.

However, as the death toll continues to rise, this argument is getting harder and harder to stand behind.

CNN looked into where they are now, and whether herd immunity has been achieved.

Herd immunity is reached when the majority of a given population — 70 to 90% — becomes immune to an infectious disease, either because they have become infected and recovered, or through vaccination. When that happens, the disease is less likely to spread to people who aren’t immune, because there just aren’t enough infectious carriers to reach them.

No community has yet achieved this and a vaccine “will get us to herd immunity quicker” than infection, Michael Mina, Assistant Professor of Epidemiology at Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, said in a recent interview with Public Radio International’s The World.

Sweden’s percentage of people with anti-bodies is not far off from those of countries that enforced strict lockdowns. In this sense, they are no closer to achieving herd immunity than anywhere else.

Sweden has revealed that despite adopting more relaxed measures to control coronavirus, only 7.3% of people in Stockholm had developed the antibodies needed to fight the disease by late April…

At the time of writing, Sweden has 32 170 confirmed cases of COVID-19, with 3 871 recorded deaths.

Compared to its Nordic neighbours, Sweden’s death toll is more than three times that of Denmark, Finland, and Norway combined, where lockdown measures were instituted.

More accurately, using deaths per million citizens as a metric, Sweden’s 384 far exceeds Denmark at 97, Finland at 55, and Norway at 43.

Dr. Mike Ryan, the executive director of the World Health Organization (WHO) Health Emergencies Program, has gone on record as saying that the concept of herd immunity was a “dangerous calculation.”

Sweden is also struggling to contain the virus in care homes, where almost half of Sweden’s fatalities linked to coronavirus have occurred.

There is still a long way to go in the battle against COVID-19, but as things stand, questions will continue to be asked about Sweden’s approach to doing so.

[source:cnn]