Jakob Billmayer from Dorfen lives in Sweden - and defends the Corona course there.
At the same time, he criticizes the measures in Germany - and Prime Minister Söder's pandemic policy.
Jakob Billmayer from Dorfen in Upper Bavaria emigrated to Sweden many years ago.
He is defending the Corona course in his new home country.
However, the emigrant cannot understand all of the corona measures in Germany.
Everything from the region is available in the Erding newsletter.
Dorfen / Halmstad
- The name says it all: The corona pandemic is occupying the whole world.
Many countries respond with lockdowns, curfews and school closings.
Sweden took a “special route” from the start and followed a much more liberal course - but with a significantly higher mortality rate than in Germany.
Lockdown in Dorfen: Emigrants defend Corona course in Sweden
Jakob Billmayer has lived in the Scandinavian country for 13 years.
He grew up in the Dorfen area and graduated from high school there in 2002.
The 38-year-old is happy to live in Sweden in the pandemic, and he is following the German course critically.
We talked to the doctor of education.
"I follow what is happening in my old home via the Internet and the local newspaper," says Billmayer, who spent his childhood in Wörth near Schwindegg and in Buchbach.
His parents were both teachers, his father teaches Swedish at the Erdinger Volkshochschule, and his uncle owns the Billmayer fashion house in Wartenberg.
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Halmstad, a 70,000-inhabitant city between Malmö and Gothenburg.
© private
His parents gave him a love for Sweden in the cradle.
“You lived there for a year,” he reports.
After graduating from high school, Billmayer decided to study Scandinavian studies, not in Sweden, but in Berlin.
“I wanted to study languages but not become a teacher,” he says.
Through a friend he met his future wife Hanna.
With her he has the six and a half year old son Ludwig and the one and a half year old Selma.
He emigrated 13 years ago, first to Sundsvall, 300 kilometers north of Stockholm, now the family lives in Halmstad, a city of almost 70,000 between Malmö and Gothenburg.
At the University of Malmö, Billmayer lectures as an educational scientist - and trains teachers.
Corona in Sweden: Emigrants criticize pandemic school policy in Germany
As a professional, he is mainly interested in the different strategies in Corona school policy.
“The main thing that frightens me about the German discussion about face-to-face teaching is the view that emerges as to what school means to society.
School and lessons are not just any material that you can get from a book or a film. "
School is rather “a place to live and learn to learn.
A place where children, who are otherwise invisible to society, become visible ”.
He is surprised that even parent and teacher associations “are not doing everything they can to return to face-to-face teaching”.
Billmayer counteracts the impression that there has been no shutdown in Sweden.
“Here, too, the upper level at schools was closed, in the spring and now again.” But: “The kindergartens and schools up to the tenth grade were always open.
I am infinitely grateful that our children can live without noticeable restrictions for them. "
Corona: Sweden are more relaxed about the pandemic - hardly any vacation trips in summer
Older students, on the other hand, were trusted to take distance learning because they can get by without supervision and structure themselves - but for a much shorter time than in their old home.
Of course, there are also strict precautions in Sweden: "Day care groups are not mixed and all events with parents have been canceled." In their new home, the majority also work from home, currently more than in spring 2020.
Billmayer has noted that Sweden and Germany are approaching the pandemic as if two Poles are diametrically apart.
“There is definitely a group in Sweden that demands a strict lockdown.” Scientists also belonged to this group.
Their status and influence can be compared with the movement in Germany, which calls for an end to all measures.
"I personally don't know anyone about it." There is broad consensus that children are not infection drivers.
Billmayer believes the Swedes are more relaxed about the pandemic than the Central Europeans.
“What we noticed here was that every opportunity was used there to occupy free space, such as the many vacation trips in summer.
Most Swedes stayed at home, even if travel was not prohibited. "
Celebrating during Corona: "In Germany, the maximum was always maxed out"
The same goes for celebrations.
"In Germany, the maximum was always maxed out." In Sweden, on the other hand, despite the low number of infections, the midsummer festival was virtually canceled, after all, a holiday is almost more important than Christmas.
"You could have celebrated that," says Billmayer.
He compares the voluntary reluctance to the blue speed limit sign on the freeway: “You know that you can drive as fast as you want.
But the sign tells you: 130 km / h is enough. "
In Sweden it is not politics that imposes restrictions, but a national authority.
That may sound less democratic, but for Billmayer it has a big advantage: "People know that there is no political race behind the regulations for the best solution and that the pandemic does not serve to raise the profile of individual politicians."
Lockdown in Bavaria: criticism of Prime Minister Söder's Corona course
At this point Billmayer is with Prime Minister Markus Söder.
In particular, he has the terms “drive on sight” and “guard rails in the pandemic” in mind.
“This metaphor may be a very honest admission of ignorance.
But it is the task of a top politician - especially in times of uncertainty - to have a vision of what will come behind the fog and perhaps not to follow the simplest path, but to find or even build new ways, ”says the educationalist.
He thinks it is wrong to operate primarily with fears.
"How does it go down with children when society says: 'You are not allowed to see grandma.'?" Better than creating fear is to create great respect.
That works better in his home country.
Billmayer makes no secret of the fact that he and many Swedes are worried about the high mortality rate.
"But we also see that there was a very strong undermortality in 2019, which is now more or less balanced." And he points out that the lockdown countries Italy, Spain, Portugal and England also have more Covid-19 deaths in percentage terms.
“Sweden is currently roughly on a par with France and Switzerland.
Corona in Sweden: Second large risk group next to seniors
The situation in the care of the elderly has become a political issue and will be a major issue in the next election campaign, Billmayer is certain - "hopefully with consequences".
In Sweden, a second risk group has been identified in addition to the very old.
“We have a migrant share of 20 percent,” recalls Billmayer, also referring to the high number of refugees who have been admitted from 2015 onwards.
Alongside Germany, Sweden was one of the main receiving countries.
"This group is particularly affected because it is often large families whose members often have no professional opportunity to go to the home office." It is a big problem to sensitize these shifts to the dangers.
The state is trying to counteract this with information in many languages.
Corona in Sweden: distance instead of protective masks
And Sweden is also taking a different approach when it comes to masks, according to Billmayer.
“When my daughter got used to kindergarten, I was left to wear a mask,” he recalls.
The concept behind it: "Whoever wears a mask thinks he has to keep his distance less." In Sweden, mouth and nose protection is largely dispensed with, but a much greater distance is maintained.
Overall, Billmayer is bothered by the restrictive policy, "that measures are compulsorily prescribed across Europe, the effectiveness of which is debatable and the risks and side effects are not known or weighed up." Although wearing masks and contact restrictions could not have prevented a second wave in Europe, and only lockdowns had provided temporary relief, "you always give more of the same medicine".
For Billmayer, this is not a long-term strategy - or the wrong one.
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