THE SWEDISH COVID-19 RESPONSE MODEL IS WORTH CONSIDERING

by Brian T. Lynch, MSW

The American Institute for Economic Research posted an article on May 6th by Daniel B. Klein that merits attention. It is a follow-up to a piece he wrote on Masks in Sweden. It seems that the Swedes have looked closely at the demographic of COVID-19 deaths in Sweden and decided that is was a relatively low-risk option to allow everyone below age 50 to work or go about their daily lives providing they used took sensible social distancing and infection avoidance precautions while everyone 50 years of age and above is expected to self-quarantine. This advice is based on the demographics of COVID-19 deaths in Sweden. It turns out that the risks faced by people over 50, or in poor health, are far greater than the rest of the population. Could that be true here in the USA?

Before answering that question, consider that from the Swedish perspective we have a binary way of viewing the problem that doesn’t allow us to think of any possible alternatives. Here is an excerpt from the Klein article:

“In fact, a more nuanced approach not only makes more sense, but is more sustainable. That is precisely what the Swedish approach is all about… If you look at the numbers, you will see that there is negligible risk to those aged 4-50 years old. This group also happens to represent the most economically productive group in society as well as the group that spends the most money. So why shut them down?"

What are the demographics of the virus in the United States?

The CDC has posted a table of provisional COVID-19 demographics on their Website. A portion of that table is reproduced below. It shows that the age demographics for COVID-19 mortality is much the same as in Sweden. As the subsequent pie chart below the table shows, fully 97% of COVID-19 deaths occur in people over 45 years of age. Here is a portion of the CDC data:

And here is the pie chart that highlights the significant differential in COVID-19 mortality risks according to just two age groupings: 

In Sweden, all at-risk people have been asked to self-quarantine, but the at-risk definition is for those most at risk of death. Also, anyone caring for or residing with those in the high-risk category are also asked to self-quarantine to help keep the at-risk people safe.

Using the Swedish model, The US could consider a gradual lifting of stay at home orders by age for healthy adults while maintaining sensible social distancing guidelines and heightened hygiene guidelines. At the same time, more resources could be focused on the at-risk populations in congregate facilities to slow down the contagion and fatality rates. The provision would have to be made to allow younger aged adults at risk due to underlying health conditions to self-quarantine without punitive consequences by their employers. It all does seem worthy of our consideration.

One question, perhaps the first question to bring up about the Sweden model is, is it working? To answer that in part, here is the Sweden graph of daily COVID-19 deaths from the Worldometer.info Website:

The answer seems to be relatively favorable given that the peak number of deaths is under 200 in a day and the trend is at least stabilizing after the peak. There are many other questions to be asked. however.  We shall see what happens over the next few weeks.