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2020-04-18 Israel-Palestine-Jordan
The Grim Truth About the "Swedish Model"
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Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 03:29|| || Front Page|| [11133 views ]  Top

#1 Funny how "we need to be more like Sweden" ain't makin' it these days.
Posted by M. Murcek 2020-04-18 04:03||   2020-04-18 04:03|| Front Page Top

#2 Well there are Swedes (of many generations) and 'Swedes' not yet of one generation. So do we know exactly where the effect is in the 'general' population or like some stats, its significantly isolated in one group?
Posted by Procopius2k 2020-04-18 07:23||   2020-04-18 07:23|| Front Page Top

#3 And probably difficult to get into those no-go zones in Stockholm and Malmø to get more detailed information.
Posted by Clem 2020-04-18 07:52||   2020-04-18 07:52|| Front Page Top

#4 Buried the lede:
To some degree, the numbers might reflect Sweden’s much larger immigrant population, but the stark disparities with its Nordic neighbors are nonetheless striking.

"To some degree," "might" - giggle.

This is an economists' blog. So this economist can't be arsed to quantify that "degree" to which Sweden's extraordinarily large, in relative terms, Somali and other African and Near Eastern Muslim immigrant population accounts for the high death rate?

Of course he senses that this is the main reason for the disparity, but his PC blinders prevent him from investigating further.

Again: Sweden's COVID fatalities are overwhelmingly concentrated in certain districts of Stockholm, and generally, in the over-80 population.

The likely explanation is that Somalis and other non-natives or immigrants resident in Stockholm are unwisely, casually exposing the elders in their communities to the virus in ways -- "to a [large] degree," to coin a phrase -- that the majority Swedish population does not.

Posted by Bigfoot Thaiting4179 2020-04-18 08:42||   2020-04-18 08:42|| Front Page Top

#5 But the IHME model, updated April 17, estimates 5,890 deaths in Sweden. Sweden has only 79 ICU beds, per the IHME data, leaving them short 1,104 beds. That suggests a lot of people are going to die because there won't be an intensive care unit for them. I trust their model includes the effects of the shortfall in ICU beds.
Posted by Bobby 2020-04-18 08:45||   2020-04-18 08:45|| Front Page Top

#6 Actually, BigFoot, he says they're 25% of the population - the stats on casualties are NOT available. But it doesn't really matters. What does is
(a) Sweden has the worse medical outcomes in the world (keeping in mind, we don't have reliable data for China and Iran).
(b) If you look at data's (in worldometers) geographical breakdown, the virus left Stockholm and went into countryside.

p.s. Is there a detailed data for Minnesota - to control (as far as possible) for genetic factors?
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 08:50||   2020-04-18 08:50|| Front Page Top

#7 There is detailed data by Swedish region - though not unfortunately by sub-region or neighborhood/district. But the regional data give strong clues as to what's going on:

The Stockholm region has a fatality rate per infection that's more than twice the rate of the rest of Sweden: about 14% vs about 6%.

The Stockholm region has a fatality per population rate that is about 6x the rate for the rest of Sweden: about 1 in 2,000 vs vs about 1 in 12,000. Stockholm region has CA 20% of Sweden's population but accounts for ca. 60% of COVID fatalities.

Here's what's missing from the data but almost certainly true: apply the same ratios within the sub-components of the Stockholm region, and you will likely see the same pattern. It's more than highly probable that Stockholm's deaths are highly concentrated in a few districts which comprise outlier populations whose behaviors do not comport with Swedish norms.

This whole episode is, in the apt phrase of Stanford epidemiologist Dr. John Ioannidis, a "data fiasco." In the Swedish case, the fiasco is not on the part of the Swedish authorities but on the part of Sweden's critics, who show themselves incapable of spotting the elephant in the room.
Posted by Lex 2020-04-18 09:41||   2020-04-18 09:41|| Front Page Top

#8 The way I understand it...
As long as you don't overwhelm your hospitals the number of dead should be the same no matter what you do

Many nations took worst case estimates and flattened the curve and extended the problem for months and are now finding out that we only risked overwhelming things in a few places at substantial cost to our economy. We could have transferred sick to other cities to avoid the stresses on NY and other areas but we didn't.

The Swedish strategy is to get it over with fast. They are cutting close to overwhelming the health care system. This means death numbers look bad now, but over time they should be roughly the same as other nations as long as they don't overwhelm the system.

My point. It's far to early to judge the Sweden plan. December might be a good time. I'm glad someone is trying something different for future comparison.
Posted by ruprecht 2020-04-18 10:09||   2020-04-18 10:09|| Front Page Top

#9 "Soviet Union wasn't real socialism!"
"Venezuela is not real socialism!"
"Real Socialism works!"
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 10:20||   2020-04-18 10:20|| Front Page Top

#10  effects of the shortfall in ICU beds.
If we accept what Cuomo said the other day (I know I know) - that 80% of those who go on ventilators never get off of them, and we assume ICU beds approximately equals ventilators, then I wonder how much real difference the potential shortfall in ICU beds makes.
Posted by Glenmore 2020-04-18 10:28||   2020-04-18 10:28|| Front Page Top

#11 ICU beds approximately equals ventilators

They don't. cf., Statewide Ventilator and ICU Bed Availability
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 10:40||   2020-04-18 10:40|| Front Page Top

#12 While we were talking, additional 111 Swedes kicked the bucked - and none recovered.
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 11:11||   2020-04-18 11:11|| Front Page Top

#13 There are two neighborhoods in Sweden that are known to be heavily Moslem--Rinkeby in Stockholm and Rosengard in Malmo. I can't find any data for Rosengard, but you can find stats for Rinkeby broken out in this link ( have to scroll way down and then flip to page 2 of the table--sorry!) It's about 4x the national average for Sweden.

https://www.thelocal.se/20200310/timeline-how-the-coronavirus-has-developed-in-sweden
Posted by Tom 2020-04-18 11:45||   2020-04-18 11:45|| Front Page Top

#14 How are 15.3 million Swedes going to die is the population of the entire country is 10.3 million?
Posted by Iblis 2020-04-18 11:46||   2020-04-18 11:46|| Front Page Top

#15 Bond Girls & Boys?
= You only die twice 1.5x...
Posted by Lex 2020-04-18 11:48||   2020-04-18 11:48|| Front Page Top

#16 #14 Just testing their theory.
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 11:55||   2020-04-18 11:55|| Front Page Top

#17 #13 Thanks, Tom. Very helpful. From the article:

While Sweden has one of Europe's highest rates of single-person households, in the Somali community "multiple generations can live in the same apartment and that can be a factor. At the same time we know that public health is generally worse in vulnerable areas," she noted.

More:

Hamid Zafar, an Afghan-born former school principal in Gothenburg, agreed, writing in an op-ed in newspaper Goteborgs-Posten that lack of information was not the main problem. Rather, Zafar argued it was authorities' lack of insight into cultural differences.

He noted for instance that the recommendation to refrain from visiting elderly relatives would be inconceivable among certain immigrant communities.

[Also,] immigrant communities sometimes have their own social networks, power hierarchies and authority figures.
He also noted that Swedish authorities ... failed to mention the risks of cramped housing or living with elderly relatives.
Posted by Lex 2020-04-18 12:00||   2020-04-18 12:00|| Front Page Top

#18 Sweden was brought up around the campfire the other night, which was replied, "Which Sweden?"

This prompted a conversation about Kansas confirms. Obviously the urban and college locations had reports, but why do Dodge City, Garden City, and Liberal have cases when the entire I-70 corridor is report-free.

The short answer is they were receptors of Obama's Immigrant Locating Program and are de facto Sanctuary Cities.

Traffic in those cowtowns is down (price) and regional, while I-70 is up and interstate. I'm sure truck stops both routes are locked down like Moon Base Alpha. I-70 has its share of white trash so we figured it isn't necessarily poverty, but lifestyle, if the premise holds true.

It also would show that the safety precautions do have an effect.

*That was the discussion. On review, I-70 traffic is likely overall down on account of skiing being cancelled and it is not tourist season. Still it is a major trucking route to and through the Rocky Mountain front range, and into Utah where it connect to routes into California ports, all the way across to Maryland, access to Chicago/Great Lakes to Houston.
Posted by swksvolFF 2020-04-18 13:30||   2020-04-18 13:30|| Front Page Top

#19 The pattern is becoming clearer: where there are multiple individuals sharing living quarters with vulnerable elderly people, the risk of infection and death is orders of magnitude greater. Where those groups also have poor health AND engage in unsanitary practices, the infection rate goes higher still.

This would largely explain the anomalies observed in among other places Lombardy, New York City, and Stockholm-Rinkevy.
Posted by Lex 2020-04-18 13:45||   2020-04-18 13:45|| Front Page Top

#20 #19 How many Muslims Germany has? What about Israel?

Give it up. Your Libertarian dream is actually bureaucratic ineptitude/stupidity.

In practice, the core task of managing the outbreak fell to a single man: state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell at the National Institute of Public Health. Tegnell approached the crisis with his own set of strong convictions about the virus, believing that it would not spread from China, and later, that it would be enough to trace individual cases coming from abroad.

Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 14:04||   2020-04-18 14:04|| Front Page Top

#21 Competing theory would be drug use, as there is a direct line from Mexico to Dodge City and then branches out, and it is just taking time to reach the I-70 corridor. Isn't quite meshing as similar size hubs are not having the cases that those three, at least not at the moment.

Meth heads, those are the ones I worry about. Early users just come across as jittery. The one I came across the other day had all the enthusiasm and clout of an uneducated boy who just chased two addddddderalll with a pot of coffee. Of course he is coughing all over the place because smoking a battery during allergy season with do that to a young man's lungs. I wanted to put on my space suit and fog the smmmbtch.

If we start seeing 30s people going down from this, this is my first suspicion.
Posted by swksvolFF 2020-04-18 14:06||   2020-04-18 14:06|| Front Page Top

#22 Economist who disagrees with me: scum
Economist who agrees with me: Delphic oracle
Posted by Lex 2020-04-18 14:35||   2020-04-18 14:35|| Front Page Top

#23 Nothing constructive to say? Quite all right.
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 14:40||   2020-04-18 14:40|| Front Page Top

#24 Sir, I salute your indefatigibility!
Moi, j'suis fatigue..

Posted by Lex 2020-04-18 15:16||   2020-04-18 15:16|| Front Page Top

#25 #23 Perhaps I should expand.
To me anybody who prefers theories to facts is scum. Not just economists: since Economy is about as much science as Astrology - only less good at prediction (John Kenneth Galbraith) I'm willing to be quite forbearing with them and conserve the bulk of my ire for my colleagues.
Anybody who prefers facts over theories is good - even if economist (or even physicist).
Capisce?
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 15:18||   2020-04-18 15:18|| Front Page Top

#26 Moy droog, I confess I can't keep up the pace with you ... you're wearing me out. Maybe you're right. I can't do much more or conclude much beyond the above -- no one can, really -- with the very limited, inconsistent, likely improperly-coded and -collected data sets that are available to us.

So ima hafta leave it there.
Posted by Lex 2020-04-18 15:25||   2020-04-18 15:25|| Front Page Top

#27 ^But just read the paper. They didn't do it out of convictions. They just let their "Fauci" decide - and backed him all the way!
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 15:29||   2020-04-18 15:29|| Front Page Top

#28 Facts are fungible too. And subject to selective analysis. But it's a "fact," it sanctifies everything it touches...
Posted by M. Murcek 2020-04-18 16:10||   2020-04-18 16:10|| Front Page Top

#29 **To be fair, the observations discussed are based on anecdotal evidence based upon observations and theories. An after-hours brain storm concerning disease vector, economic considerations, and social interactions.

See, there was an unexpected balloon in confirmed cases in the Dodge City area, with Garden City and Liberal as box/whiskers outliers with the surrounding counties.

The majority of Kansas cases are in Wyondotte County, Kansas City area, shithole - the affluent Johnson County home to many groundskeepers - and Sedgwick County an official Sanctuary City Wichita.

What a disease is leads to why a disease spreads which leads to how we cope with it.

I live and grew up in a handshake culture, sealing the deal...regionally we like our spicy food which leads to the inevitable nose wipe. Very different than a culture which finds handshaking repulsive. Put up a stop sign and see how many drive through it out of habit, culture if you will. Observant peoples adjust quickly, laissez-faire roll through longer.

To end a ramble for now, rather than a rant, we must know the why it spreads before how we deal with it.
Posted by swksvolFF 2020-04-18 16:35||   2020-04-18 16:35|| Front Page Top

#30 So is the omission of data, such as income level and neighborhood concentrations.

I was very careful to stay at lifestyle, as religion does contribute to behavior, behavior is not solely dependent upon religion.

I've always found the transition from Macro to Micro more difficult than Micro to Macro. For instance, "How do you feel?" "Well I have shortness of breath and feel hot." Compared to, "I crushed my wrist." "How far up is the pain?"
Posted by swksvolFF 2020-04-18 16:49||   2020-04-18 16:49|| Front Page Top

#31 The dirtiest rube in the country smells better than the average city dweller. Check it out...
Posted by M. Murcek 2020-04-18 16:57||   2020-04-18 16:57|| Front Page Top

#32 G(r)om - I would suggest you'll attract more conversation with more honey, less vinegar. We had a commenter, Mike Sylwester, who was frequently correct, but turned other commenters off with the aspersions (something I'm guilty of at times, as well, acknowledged)
Posted by Frank G 2020-04-18 17:19||   2020-04-18 17:19|| Front Page Top

#33 I know you mean well Frank.
Posted by g(r)omgoru 2020-04-18 17:45||   2020-04-18 17:45|| Front Page Top

#34 Happens to the best of us

Cast a cold eye on life, on death.
Rantburger, rant on!
Posted by Lex 2020-04-18 17:59||   2020-04-18 17:59|| Front Page Top

#35 Look the guy's a prig and proud of it. Trying to help him along is a fools errand. Let him club us with his "facts" and magic numbers and move on. The effort will toughen you up.
Posted by M. Murcek 2020-04-18 18:55||   2020-04-18 18:55|| Front Page Top

#36 I may range, but only at Rantburg do I find strong, passionate minds I only dare to approach around the campfire.

To burn economy for time, I still think, was the right call.

Sweden as a control group, makes sense but only if we are able to scrutinize the individual stats; the Sim City way if you will.

That thrashing we hear are businesses which have been underwater long enough to think they are drowning.

Never mind all the other ingredients to this stew which contribute to the steam to blow the lid off.

The anti-authoritarians: NWA to Moonshiners
The chauffer clans
The devoutly religious
Seasonal migrants from all income levels
Then all the people who do follow the rules, and see others get away with flaunting the rules

For Sweden, the die is cast. Kansas, I hate to agree but maybe two weeks more is acceptable as we have always been a bit of a time capsule.

Both bare observation.
Posted by swksvolFF 2020-04-18 18:56||   2020-04-18 18:56|| Front Page Top

#37 As a right veteran of tornado and fire weather forecast models, I'm glad to have all the information available.
Posted by swksvolFF 2020-04-18 18:59||   2020-04-18 18:59|| Front Page Top

#38 The virus magic numbers are insanely politically distorted. To call them information us to desecrate the word.
Posted by M. Murcek 2020-04-18 19:13||   2020-04-18 19:13|| Front Page Top

#39 Is to
Posted by M. Murcek 2020-04-18 19:14||   2020-04-18 19:14|| Front Page Top

#40 Claude Shannon would point out the politically reported magic numbers aren't even noise from an information theory standpoint
Posted by M. Murcek 2020-04-18 19:19||   2020-04-18 19:19|| Front Page Top

#41 
Posted by Ulusorong Gleanter8529 2020-04-18 21:57||   2020-04-18 21:57|| Front Page Top

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