Corona: herd immunity in Sweden? Pandemic "could be over for the country" - at a high price

Hardly any country polarized more with its corona policy than Sweden.

But has the special path really paid off?

One scientist thinks the local pandemic "could be over."

• Sweden is fighting the coronavirus * in its own way.

• State epidemiologist Anders Tegnell relies on less severe restrictions than other European countries.

• Is this strategy now paying off?

Copenhagen - The

in

"could be over". This remarkable sentence comes from the renowned Danish epidemiologist

and makes you sit up and take

notice

- as always when the terms

and

in the

same

breath. The largest country in Scandinavia was When it came to

, it went a separate way, relying more on voluntariness instead of strict measures: at least legal looseness instead of lockdown.

Corona in Sweden: After criticism of the Sonderweg - "there are signs of a kind of immunity"

In the meantime, it looked as if this premise, for which state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell was in charge, threatened to fail.

A high death rate as well as a drastically failed comparison with Scandinavia gave rise to criticism of the Swedish way.

But now the situation is more relaxed again.

So has the unorthodox approach paid off and is the

in the Scandinavian country really over?

+

tvätta händera - wash your hands.

Tegnell as an icon on a poster outside a restaurant in Stockholm.

The 64-year-old state epidemiologist took a different path than many of his European colleagues.

The gastronomy in Sweden was allowed to be open almost without restriction for a long time.

© AFP / JONATHAN NACKSTRAND

"There is evidence that

has gained some kind of immunity to the disease * which, along with everything else they do to prevent the infection from spreading, is enough to keep the disease down," said

, professor at the

, and a member of the Royal Danish Science Society, now the newspaper

. 

Corona in Sweden: Europe comparison is positive - almost on a par with Germany

Sweden

immune to

?

Not quite.

There are still

in the country.

If you look at the 14-day incidence of the World Health Organization, however, it is noticeable that

actually one of the countries in Europe that

currently has

best under control.

The following infobox shows how many people

in selected European countries are

infected

*.

The situation is grim in

and most relaxed in

(five cases per 100,000 inhabitants). 

14-day incidence in Europe (source: WHO, as of September 21, 7 p.m.)

1. Andorra: 452 cases per 100,000 population

2. Montenegro: 360

3. Spain: 227

4. France: 198

5. Czech Republic: 197

13. Austria: 105

32. Italy: 34

37.Sweden: 27

38. Germany: 26

The

in

is currently pretty good comparable to that in

.

Should mean,

is still ubiquitous, but compared to other countries you are in a pretty good position.

But how does Sneppen come to the conclusion

that the pandemic may be over

in

?

Corona in Sweden: Because of "super spreaders" - herd immunity already achieved?

Together with his colleague Lone Simonsen at the University of

scientist developed

a model to explain the course of the pandemic in Sweden and Denmark, which

examined

the importance of “

”.

This group is a minority in the population who spread the virus disproportionately.

It can be assumed that “

” played a decisive role at the beginning of the pandemic in

, they judged.

The findings, however, coincide with a study published in August by Stockholm University.

In the work initiated by Tom Britton, it was estimated that the threshold for full

might only be 43 percent of the population instead of the 60 to 70 percent

traditionally assumed

in

.

If a country

- be it through infection or vaccination - the spread of a pathogen is reduced.

The calculation is simple, but is it also true?

Corona in Sweden: pandemic "could be over" - surprising thesis with a catch

What is decisive for the interpretation of the results is that the study postulates that the most sociable and socially active members of society, i.e. the “super spreaders” described by Sneppen, were the first to be infected.

So be

more quickly possible, because "already 20 percent immunity make a pretty big difference," Britton said

.

So how is the Swedish way to be assessed?

Often scolded and now praised?

While

says the country had a much higher mortality rate in April, May and June than Denmark, for example, “that's what they paid for.

It is positive that the

now be over ”.

With a total of 5,865 corona deaths, a rather expensive victim.

This also means

, professor of Biomedicine at the University of

: "One can argue that they have chosen the right solution, but they were initially poorly prepared for the strategy."

"The pandemic is probably over in Sweden" says Kim Sneppen, professor at Niels Bohr-Institutet https://t.co/H2ZUfvLuXC

- Rebecca Chandler (@ RebeccaChandle1) September 18, 2020

Corona in Sweden: Sonderweg could have paid off and authorities "were right"

Overall, however,

suggests a similar notch and says, "that more and more things indicated that the Swedish health authority could have been right with its strategy, which made a controlled development of immunity possible in the first place."

All in all, a lot would have, would be and could - but from a Swedish point of view, the statements of the scientists are definitely positive.

The current figures do not suggest that

in the country and there are still voices from scientists that the second wave * could come in Sweden, but the situation is generally quite calm - now the country is challenged to maintain this position.

After all, it already knows how bad the coronavirus can strike.

List of rubric lists: © picture alliance / dpa / Claudio Bresciani