Sweden "
failed
" against the Covid-19, said its king Carl XVI Gustaf Thursday, December 17, in a rare comment likely to consolidate the criticisms against the atypical strategy of the country plagued by a strong second wave.
“
I believe we have failed,
” the sovereign told SVT public television.
Read also: Covid-19: Sweden again in difficulty in the face of the second wave
“A
lot of people have died, and it's terrible.
It's something that makes us all suffer,
”he added, according to extracts released Thursday from a traditional end-of-year interview.
While he did not explicitly target Swedish strategy, the King's critical commentary is highly unusual.
In Sweden, the king, although head of state, has no power.
Asked by AFP, the palace said that it should not be read a political commentary.
“
This must be interpreted in an apolitical way.
The king refers to the whole of Sweden and to all of society,
”said Margareta Thorgren, spokesperson at the royal court.
"
What the king is doing is showing empathy for all those who have been affected in different ways, as well as those who have died,
" she said.
Despite a recent tightening of the authorities, Sweden and its atypical strategy against the coronavirus are again put in great difficulty by a formidable second wave that the Nordic country has long believed it could avoid.
While most other European countries have confined their populations once or more, Sweden has at no time closed its bars, restaurants and shops, and has mostly stuck to
non-coercive
“
recommendations
”.
In the kingdom of 10.3 million people, the death toll reached 7,893 on Thursday, including more than 1,900 since early November.
Hospitalizations have reached a new record, as have the number of new cases, now between 6,000 to 7,000 per day on average, according to official data.
