Thanks for your article. On Unherd they are continually pushing Sweden as the ideal model for Covid strategy. They've had several articles on the subject. But I think it's too simplistic to compare countries like that. There are too many variables and I think that epidemics are sensitive to small differences in parameters. I have no proof of that, just my instinct.
I did see a piece by Swiss Policy Research titled "The Nine Great COVID mysteries." One can agree or disagree about what constitutes the universe of mysteries, but I did like that piece, because it did illuminate things that are hard to understand. Like, why have East Asian countries (Japan, South Korea, etc.) "performed" so well while other, developed countries in the West appear to have performed so poorly in comparison?
And then there is the fact that African countries seem to have been untouched by COVID. Age distribution provides a good explanation for the African (and Indian) experience, it seems. But not the Asian experience.
I did examine performance across states (in the US). Sure enough, there is convergence across states over time. The suggestion is that differences in COVID policies did /not/ yield differences in performance. But, there are mysterious outliers. Like, Hawaii has been virtually untouched. Why? Because the population is much, much younger? Because it's relative isolation made a difference? If isolation made a difference, then is Hawaii's population still "immunologically naive" with respect to COVID? And, if so, will COVID yet catch up with it? Or, has Hawaii managed to miss the boat on COVID; COVID has mutated into nothing special; the threat to Hawaii going forward is modest to nil? Can we say the same of New Zealand?
Thanks for your article. On Unherd they are continually pushing Sweden as the ideal model for Covid strategy. They've had several articles on the subject. But I think it's too simplistic to compare countries like that. There are too many variables and I think that epidemics are sensitive to small differences in parameters. I have no proof of that, just my instinct.
I did see a piece by Swiss Policy Research titled "The Nine Great COVID mysteries." One can agree or disagree about what constitutes the universe of mysteries, but I did like that piece, because it did illuminate things that are hard to understand. Like, why have East Asian countries (Japan, South Korea, etc.) "performed" so well while other, developed countries in the West appear to have performed so poorly in comparison?
Here it is: https://swprs.org/the-nine-great-covid-mysteries/
And then there is the fact that African countries seem to have been untouched by COVID. Age distribution provides a good explanation for the African (and Indian) experience, it seems. But not the Asian experience.
I did examine performance across states (in the US). Sure enough, there is convergence across states over time. The suggestion is that differences in COVID policies did /not/ yield differences in performance. But, there are mysterious outliers. Like, Hawaii has been virtually untouched. Why? Because the population is much, much younger? Because it's relative isolation made a difference? If isolation made a difference, then is Hawaii's population still "immunologically naive" with respect to COVID? And, if so, will COVID yet catch up with it? Or, has Hawaii managed to miss the boat on COVID; COVID has mutated into nothing special; the threat to Hawaii going forward is modest to nil? Can we say the same of New Zealand?
A lot of puzzles, indeed.