Fredrik74

What you are saying that Lombardy should open up again. What's a few thousand deaths? What you pretend is just irrational fear is actually people seeing what is happening and not wanting it to happen to them or people they know.

You have to realize that just because you don't want to believe the Imperial College report doesn't make it false. The reality on the ground shows clearly what happens if our healthcare system is overwhelmed. This is why countries who are not Sweden have restrictions. Yes, some of it may be political grandstanding but rest assured that these people know what a stockmarket is. Btw, i do too. I have access to people at Nasdaq if I need. Others there have my number if there's a need.

nacho

That's the thing! A lot of speech police wants everyone to think that school is virus free - and yet a school in Jonkoping is closed because 2 staff got it.

RedChili

Lombardy has been exceptionally hard hit, with almost 7,000 dead in one region alone. But you also have to remember that this extraordinary high number probably means that a large part of the population was infected already before the lockdown was instituted in Italy. If we assume a death rate of 1% (which is probably too high, see Ioannidas's calculations further up in this thread), and if we assume a period of four weeks from the time of infection until the time of death, we can estimate that four weeks ago, on March 3, at least 700,000 people were infected in Lombardy. By now, it is entirely possible that a continuation of the lockdown will have no effect whatsoever on stopping or slowing the spread of the virus. If I was in charge of things in Lombardy, I would do everything in my power to start testing huge parts of the population as quicly as possible.

Nobody has said that the schools overall are virus free, but it's an evaluation based on a number of factors, such as: 1) Most young kids don't catch the virus. 2) The few young kids that do catch it could spread it also by playing with their friends. 3) We don't want kids to be with their grandparents instead of in school. 4) Closing the schools would keep essential workers away from their jobs. 5) Kids in poorer families would possibly not get a healthy meal at least once per day. 6) Kids with violent parents would be exposed to their outbursts 24/7, and nobody would be able to help them.

GUWonder

Most young kids in Sweden will probably have caught the virus by some point, unless the spreading is substantially slowed down and/or a vaccine comes around and is used in wide part.

Swedish kids tend to be herded by their parents all to the very same national nexuses mostly within the same limited periods of time. That’s a recipe for more national spread, not less.

Astrid Lindgren’s World, Kolmarden, Grona Lund, Skansen and that place in Gothenburg are to Swedish kids and their family what Stockholm/Gothenburg/Malmo and Ĺre/Visby are to the partying crowd of older teenagers and adults in Sweden. We can thank these herd ways and this “herd immunity experiment” for setting up another wave of this virus in Sweden.

It’s going to be interesting to see what Sweden does with the end of the school year with its school closing activities at churches and at school grounds that also end up being stuffed to the gills.

CPH-Flyer

1% is probably too low for Italy. South Korea with their massive testing regime is running at 1.7%, where many of their cases from the religious group are among younger people. Plus the hospital system was never overwhelmed like it has become in Italy. And the mistakes admitted in Italian hospitals for early cases did not happen in Korea. You can't really mean that you expect to find a lower fatality rate in Italy than in Korea?

It is interesting that the experts you quote always like to do their math without the one country that has the best statistical base. Maybe it should be least bad statistical base as things are very much still developing.

JR67

That study is a joke.The authors are serious, but incompetent. You are absolutely right, the numbers don't add up. And to try to give myself some credibility here, I am probably the only one on this topic who has published in the International Journal of Epidemiology....

The problem with calculating mortality due to viruses is huge. As has been pointed out here we ONLY know the numerator, and we have no idea about the denominator. How many have been infected? We will never know. Also, different countries have different age distributions. Italy is the second oldest country in the world - it will have high death rates at the aggregate level, but maybe normal rates if we age-standardize.

RedChili

The best statistical base right now is the Diamond Princess, simply because everybody was tested on that ship. 19% of the people on board were infected, and so far, 1.4% of the infected have died. It's worth to notice that most passengers on that ship belonged to the high risk category.

Italy will probably have a higher death rate than many other countries, due to such factors as an ageing population, many lifestyle diseases, many smokers, an abundance of resistent bacteria in the hospitals, unprepared hospitals, etc. Ioannides' calculations were based on the Princess, extrapolated to the U.S. population, which ended up between 0.05-1%. I don't really know how to compare the U.S. and the Italian population, but I would be surprised if the Italian number is higher than 1%.

Anyway, we will probably never know. The experts will probably debate the death rate for years to come. They still don't agree about the death rate for the 2009 swine flu epidemic.

nacho

I don't have any science background and even judge it with common sense it doesn't add up (maybe they could explain the situation in the UK before the huge numbers of infected and died). There's a mathematician in Lund is trying to find some models base on certain scenarios - as you said the denominator is unknown.

nacho

Definitely - they can't take a quick day trip to Tivoli

JR67

The problem with mathematicians looking at this is the same as the evolutionary biologists in Oxford. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Honestly, right now the best thing is to minimize exposure for those who will need respirators.That means close down exposure pathways. That means physical distancing. My take is that at least 70% of use will get it - that is the accepted level of the Spanish Flu. The slower we get there the easier it is on the health care services. The faster we get there the faster everything goes back to normal. If we go fast a lot of people will die unnecessarily. If we go slow the economy will take a heavy hit. Rock and hard place anyone?

JR67

So let's do the math. The Diamond Princess has a passenger capacity of 2670 and a crew of 1100 = 3670 total. With an infection rate (which you proudly typed) of 0.19% we get roughly 7 infected. With a mortality rate or 1.7% we get 0.1 fatalities. According to Wikipedia, 712 of 3711 on board tested positive = 19%. 19% is not 0.19% although the numbers come from the same place. 0.19 is 712/3711. THIS is where the major confusion comes from. Inability to do simple math and understand simple science. I think this is maybe a good time to say to all of us who aren't professionals: Shut the F¤#¤ up and let professionals talk. All this idiotic "I have googled more than you" ........ is hurting us. If you aren't professionally trained in virology, epidemiology, medicine, or public health then please shut up and start listening to those who are!

GUWonder

The Danish PM says she wants to start opening up from just after Easter.

My “hot-air” bet is that at some point the Swedish situation with this virus will result in Denmark wanting to shut down even more from Sweden.

nacho

Everywhere should have defined who is in the risk group and then protect them. The problem with the Swedish way is that they are hitting everyone - and finally the government stop visits to elderly homes - which is not even something new because kommun like Staffanstorp has done that a while ago.

I'm not an expert and the reasoning for my own decision is based on my risk of needing a ventilator that I probably won't have access to.

Don't worry, the Danish government is smart enough not to let Swedes to infect them, in Helsingoer some elderly homes are worried about their Swedish workers. They can't send them home because the majority of the workers are from Sweden.

Fredrik74

Yes, but what are the risk groups? First it was the elderly and people with certain problems. Now more and more points to being a smoker and/or obese is maybe as bad. Just do the math on how many are a risk group in that case.

RedChili

I don't know why you have to be such a moron here. If you know maths, it should be very plain to you that this was a simple decimal mistake where I just forgot to multiply by 100. I just typed in 712 divided by 3711 into the calculator, and the result was 0.19. Yes, I should have multiplied by 100 afterwards, something which I forgot, but that's no reason for you to use such extreme rude language. You complain about "inability to do simple math," but if you would've had that ability yourself, you would have recognized this decimal mistake immediately. It's a common mistake that a lot of people do.