Those numbers are suspicious until you make them comparable after adjusting for testing rates. The US has tested more people than Sweden. Then in California, especially in San Fran, they have done a lot less testing as well. In fact, the doctors there are now saying that they may have had community spread far earlier than anyone thought, because their leaders were so slow to react, with Pelosi and other galavanting around San Fran Chinatown, instead of doing anything to prepare for COVID. Ironically, San Fran may have done more to be like Sweden by letting things go for longer, which may be to San Fran's long term benefit.
So one way we might make these numbers comparable is as follows. Let's divide each number (deaths/M people) by the tested/M people in those areas. Then we'll have numbers that are comparable apples to apples, because the only deaths that are being counted are those deaths that are known to have been from COVID, which means they must have been tested. I don't have the San Fran breakdown, so I'll use California as the proxy for San Fran. Here's what we see then:
Sweden
* Deaths/M = 119
* Tested/M = 7,387
* Deaths/Tested = 1.61%
US
* Deaths/M = 83
* Tested/M = 9,524
* Deaths/Tested = 0.87%
California
* Deaths/M = 20
* Tested/M = 5,502
* Deaths/Tested = 0.36%
So what's the conclusion here? Looking at the US vs Sweden, we might say that shutting down the economy does seem to lower the death/tests rate. But then when we realize California was far more lax than the rest of the US, because they were late to shutting anything down, then that tells us the opposite, which is that maybe shutting down is not decreasing the death rate. Also, the world has yet to see what the second wave of COVID looks like and how that will impact countries who have limited herd immunity to their shutdowns versus Sweden and San Fran that likely have far higher herd immunity due to not shutting down in Sweden and shutting down late in California. I still think this thing is going to require herd immunity to beat it. Whether we get herd immunity naturally through exposure or through vaccines, either way, we'll need herd immunity to put COVID behind us. |
