No politician, of any gender, anywhere, can control a virus or prevent people from getting and spreading it. It would be great to think that all New York State would have had to do to save lives would have been to trade Andrew Cuomo for Sanna Marin. But that would not have magically turned New Yorkers into Finns anymore than it would have turned the US into Finland.
Just curious – are you equally egalitarian in other areas? Say, if one person gets rich and another stays poor, is that purely because of differing circumstances and entirely unrelated to their personal qualities and skills?
I don’t know you, so I won’t assume the answer. But I do think it’s amazing how many pull-yourselves-up-by-your-bootstraps conservatives have turned into stoical fatalists all of a sudden. Now, me, I instinctively distrust any narrative that has heroes and villains, so I do personally think that running an orderly country with good preparedness had more to do with the result than the person in the big chair having a vagina – but then, I’m a bleeding-heart lefty who thinks that no one is all that responsible for what happens to them.
I’m not sure how it’s “egalitarian” to note that no one person can magically transform New Yorkers into Finns or the UK or US into Finland. If you believe that a politician could perform this feat, how exactly would they accomplish that? Also have no idea what bootstraps have to do with this, it appears you’re responding to someone else’s post.
You are right, but I do believe (complicated topic) that politicians matter. You might agree or disagree with Merkel’s policies (immigration and nuclear power are my bone) but NO ONE can question her ability to grasp detail and have the gravitas to explain the situation to the public.
If results were not what mattered, I might agree with you. Explaining a situation and persuading people to view it the same way you do are two entirely different things. Also, I’d point out that people do consider WHO it is doing the explaining, to use your example of Angela Merkel without commenting on her immigration policy itself, people do consider how much her own life is impacted by her policies.
I was dealing with Covid as per the article. And I wrote in my original comment: “You might agree or disagree with Merkel’s policies (immigration and nuclear power are my bone) but NO ONE can question her ability to grasp detail and have the gravitas to explain the situation to the public.” Most people don’t listen (or read) WHO proclamation, but they do listen to their elected leader.
Actually, you were the one who brought up immigration policies. Merkel’s ability to grasp and explain detail does not, as we can see in Germany today, necessarily persuade people to her way of thinking. My WHO comment does not refer to the World Health Organization. It refers to the person who is setting and explaining policies. In your Germany example, people do take into account how and whether Merkel’s immigration policies affect her life as they do the lives of Germans in general. And this isn’t limited to Merkel. You can find examples all over the world, particularly in the time of COVID. Shutting down restaurants by decree and then eating out yourself makes people consider how your policies affect your life as opposed to how they effect the lives of would be patrons as well as the owners and employees of closed restaurants.
David Bell
3 years ago
I’m afraid this article shows just how poorly Covid 19 is being reported by our media. I pick out two glaring issues:
1. There appears to be a inverse correlation between flu deaths over the last 3 years and Covid 19 deaths. In the UK deaths flu deaths were below the long term average in Finland they were above. UK Covid deaths are high, Finland Covid deaths are low. This pattern repeats for multiple countries. This is luck, not judgement 2. The article congratulates Finland for closing it’s borders yet the EU criticised Trump when he did the same. Why is it OK for a socialist to close border but OK for those same socialists to shout “Racism” when a right winger does the same
I think it is interesting that two leaders take the same course of action, one is criticised at the time then ignored the other is celebrated. That tells you everything!
Interesting point. Perhaps the criticism of the US closing its borders is based in part on the vastly greater number of people trying to get into the US for one reason or another (business, family-related, tourism, college attendance, etc). If the US closes its borders it’s going to inconvenience and disappoint far greater numbers of people that Finland doing the same thing.
Good points, but they were not the arguments at the time.
At the time is was said to be an overreaction to Trump and inherently racist. I believe it was these comments that stop Johnson closing UK in the same way.
We now get articles like this congratulating left wing leaders for closing their borders and criticism of Johnson for not doing it fast enough but, as usual, Trump is ignored.
True, but the arguments don’t always reflect the real concerns. Particularly when it comes to Trump. Let’s just say that I’m unwilling to always credit an argument as the real concern. And there’s no doubt that the US closing its borders inconvenienced and disappointed far more people than Finland doing so. Not to mention the US being among the first to close borders. The fact that it became acceptable once other countries did it only reinforces my point.
Your argument is a false and shallow one. You don’t like Trump therefore Trump can only do bad things. The reverse also appears to be true. So your analysis of policy is based on your opinion of the person not the validity of their policy. It doesn’t matter who was first or who was inconvenienced (lets face it covid 19 response has been inconvenient for everyone!) the policy was either right or wrong. Just because Trump went first does not make him wrong and those “nice” socialist who went second right!
It is this mentality that leads people to flick through history to find small events to “cancel” historical figures. It also leads to a potentially very dangerous position were people who are deemed to be good do something bad. Think Aung San Suu Kyi as a classic example of both good a bad in the same person. Should we write her off as bad, or did she still do some very worthwhile things?
We need to take each policy or action on it’s merits. Johnson was wrong not to close our airports. He didn’t because people who didn’t like Trump called his actions “racist” and Johnson was afraid those same people would brand him “racist” as well. The UK suffered more deaths as a result. The knee jerk reaction of those who hate Trump and jsut critics his every move cause bad policy decisions in the UK leading to lose of life.
My point was the exact opposite. Policy should NOT be based on opinion of the person setting the policy. Try reading more carefully.
Criticism of the US for closing borders while not criticizing other countries for doing the same thing IS basing analyzing policy based on the person making the policy. If you can locate where I said Trump was wrong to close the borders, let me know. And yes it indeed does matter who was inconvenienced at least as far as the criticism goes. Not many people are trying to get into Finland even in non Covid times. The US closing its borders is hugely inconvenient to many many more people.
In comparisons with both Sweden and the UK, this article doesn’t address density of population, size of susceptible population – age and co-morbidities, size of minority populations in Northern Europe who have shown susceptibility to Covid because of Vit D deficiencies, the amount of incoming tourism and outgoing travel of citizens leading up to the pandemic, how care homes are organized and size of care home populations. I’m sure there are many more variables.
Indeed, the conceit that central authorities can control the virus might be just that: a conceit.
No obvious patterns emerge from international data. East Asian countries may have fared well, with Taiwan leading the pack, but Taiwan did not impose a harsh lockdown whereas South Korea did. Japan’s measure were also less harsh than those in Korea. Meanwhile the yo-yo pattern in COVID fatalities shows up everywhere. It is not obvious that government interventions are influencing those patterns for the better. Government may very well be do nothing more than reacting to phenomena it can’t control. It may even be exacerbating the situation.
From what I’ve read, the eastern countries have older people who are healthier and in the case of Japan, I’ve read that they have higher levels of Vitamin D. I wish we could see more information from the East. And yes, lockdowns have been inaccurate, blunt and devastating instruments.
The UK government has been very good at introducing new restrictions, just as Covid cases have begun to fall in the effected area. They can then claim victory for the continuing drop in cases without any evidence for true cause and effect. Correlation does not imply causation!
Population density, Innate immunity, healthier populations, better institutionalized care for the elderly. I’d like to see these looked at. Instead the only thing talked about are lockdowns and mask wearing. LOL. We might as well be living in the 18th century.
Every system/society/government has variables – as far as we can tell UK’s high death rate (vs Germany) is because the country closed down too late. And German GOV was able to quickly ramp up test and track. Sweden vs Finland/Denmark/Norway is the same story – the country refused to close down and failed to test and track.
Sweden has twice the population and the largest city of all 3. It would be interesting to see the mobility of each country. How much travel out of country for work and business. Also foreign travel statistics. The infatuation with lockdown and mask wearing is actually rather bizarre. It is assumed that these things are the most important. That isn’t proven. It would be interesting to look at elderly care and long term health care practices. As the disease particularly targets elderly and people in poor health it seems like countries with heathier populations and better elderly care would fare far better than those that don’t. I see almost no attempt to look at this.
And another variable…education. Finns achieve excellent standards of numeracy and literacy, approaching that of some Asian countries. Maybe a clue there as to why some countries fare better than others in a pandemic
Christian Filli
3 years ago
Once again I see a culturally biased attempt to convey that women are somehow superior at handling this crisis (“Three of these top five nations are led by women …”). If we are going to celebrate nations that have truly crushed the virus, then why not start with CHINA? It is the epicenter of the pandemic and it is run by an authoritarian male-dominant regime, yet somehow this nation of over 1.4 billion people (including several of the largest, most densely populated urban areas in the world) has managed to keep the number of total infections below 100,000, and its economy is doing far better than anyone else. And by the way, no reported cases among any of its political leaders (as has been the norm in the West). Wanna tell a success story? Start with China (if you dare).
Spot on. China is the ultimate success story, given its population and population density. But enthusiasm will be rather measured in this case, because lauding China for its handling of the pandemic will imply a certain acceptance of its general model ““ and I don’t think there will be too many enthusiasts of that. For good reason, too.
This particular article is not about the virus per se. It is about the long-term tendency in our society to demonize men and call into question their leadership skills, which are of course informed by toxic/fragile masculinity. The underlying message is simple: elect a young-ish woman who comes from a same-sex household, and the sky is the limit.
My old boss contacted me from China in, I think, late April. He isn’t in Wuhan. He said they hadn’t really locked down and that everything was more or less normal. As others have pointed out, there was already a degree of immunity in many Asian countries.
i have just watched another Ivor Cummins video in which he demonstrates that lockdowns and masks etc don’t work.
I think that you’d find that they did lockdown in Wuhan. Went early (but maybe not early enough, because then we’d be spared this plague) and hard. And the Chinese economy appears to have grown this year.
Lockdown was late January and they started opening up in March. Normal travel was resumed on April 8th. They resumed partying in September. LOL. https://www.itv.com/news/20…
China’s success story is almost certainly the result of pre-existing immunity among large pockets of the population. Coronavirus is an ongoing series of contagions originating in China’s contact with wildlife meat markets. Covid-related viruses have been passing around Asia quietly for years now, and several of them probably prepared the collective immune system to resist COVID-19. I might also mention San Francisco, which has an unaccountably low Covid death rate, likely because of pre-existing immunity.
This is a great point, no doubt, which needs to be factored into the conversation. There’s a very sobering article on The Japan Times, titled “The West should envy Japan’s COVID-19 response”. I highly recommend it (it’s a short read).
I point this out and the number one reply I get is China is lying. No facts to support this. This is all they have.
Benedict Waterson
3 years ago
Finland population density — 18 people per square km… UK — 275… Is it perhaps easier to manage a pandemic in Finland than the UK? Also, apparently Scotland has managed the crisis statistically worse than England, but no mention of Sturgeon in this article. Perhaps because she is a nice good ‘progressive woman’
The UK could have a population density of one person per square mile and our politicians, quangos and state bodies (PHE, NHS etc) would still find a way to screw it up. As has been obvious for some decades, they are devoid of all competence or integrity.
Good luck to Sanna Marin. Since Thatcher left we have been governed by a succession of middle class white men, and one middle class white woman, whose policies and decisions have been an almost total failure. And things are about to get a whole lot worse with the Green New Deal and various other ruinous monstrosities.
Yes. It’s really difficult to compare countries. Germany does seem to be a genuine success story. Tom Chivers wrote a good article on here, suggesting some of the reasons why that might be
bob alob
3 years ago
It’s nonsensical to compare Finland and the UK’s performance in dealing with the pandemic, London alone has a far greater population than Finland, you could pick any person off the street and they could have had a similar outcome as Marin.
London has a greater population than Scotland, but Scotland has performed no better than England and, I believe, worse on some measures. So Finland would appear to have done something right.
On many public health measures, Scotland has been one of the worst performers in Europe for a long time (fried Mars Bar, anyone?) So it’s hardly surprising that coronavirus has hit it hard.
Uruguay has 25 Deaths per million, Finland 76, three time more, the government never enforce any look down, just recommendations (similar to the Swedish approach). I wonder why the media is ignoring this success, is it because goes against the general rhetoric pro lock downs and government strong intervention limiting individual freedom? It doesn’t help that the president, Mr Luis Lacalle Pou is from a centre right coalition, not a socialist, his gender doesn’t make him a good story either. Just saying
Paul Tanner
3 years ago
I will start this comment by stating that by no measure do I believe that UK has had a “good” Pandemic. But how much of that is due to the failures of BJ as Prime Minister is another matter. And the same question must apply in converse to Ms Marin and the apparently rather better Finnish experience. I genuinely wish I could understand the reasons for the apparently widely diverging numerical outcomes for Covid deaths across European countries. It does seem to be a lot more complex than the individuals (or even political parties) in charge. It is also more complicated than can be explained by simply trying to allow for factors such as population density, ethnicity, age distribution, prior health patterns etc etc etc. The following article is interesting in concentrating particularly on Sweden (in so going it brings in other Nordic countries as a comparator as well as those in the Far East). I am not sure if Unherd allows URLs in comments or references to alternative publications. Just search for “We need to speak about Sweden more than ever By Kathy Gyngell” –
The article itself says very little, and as far as speaking about Sweden goes, the mouth says shut. Are you sure that you’re not just spruiking for Ivor C?
Jeremy Smith
3 years ago
I think it is too early to make a final judgement on government(s) handling of C19. May be some countries got lucky and some (Italy) did not. Yes, there are national character differences that made a big difference – as of now- in the handling of crisis. FT had an article about Sweden and C19, one Swedish political commentators was quoted that the Swedish PM came from union background and never cared much about policy making only about power. That is something he has in common with BoJo. I think in case of C19 a serious politician that cares about policy and understand details would have performed than a BSer (BoJo). BSer can win election…but can they govern? Marin is Finnish and they don’t do BSing.
Apparently constitutionally Sweden could not lock down by law… just for starters.
Bengt Hansson
3 years ago
It can be noted that Finland has adopted a pragmatic land border control to Sweden, contrary to Norway´s ‘zero-covid’ approach. However, fully opened borders Fin-Swe for <1 week in september. For a good review of the Nordic countries outcome, please read https://sebastianrushworth….
Dennis Boylon
3 years ago
Not a very convincing article. All of Asia has low death numbers. This seems to imply some innate immunity already unless you buy into the theory of the effectiveness of masks. Even with large dense cities like Tokyo Japan only has seen 19 deaths per million. I don’t think you can put that down to masks. New Zealand, Finland, Norway all sparsely populated with far less international travel than the US, UK, France, or Spain.
Simon Forde
3 years ago
Given the ethnic make-up of many Finns and Estonians, has anyone studied if the comparative success, compared with their Nordic and Germanic neighbours has a genetic or ethnic component? Before we run down the rabbit hole of ascribing better death rates in countries primarily down to their political leaders’ competence.
No politician, of any gender, anywhere, can control a virus or prevent people from getting and spreading it. It would be great to think that all New York State would have had to do to save lives would have been to trade Andrew Cuomo for Sanna Marin. But that would not have magically turned New Yorkers into Finns anymore than it would have turned the US into Finland.
Just curious – are you equally egalitarian in other areas? Say, if one person gets rich and another stays poor, is that purely because of differing circumstances and entirely unrelated to their personal qualities and skills?
I don’t know you, so I won’t assume the answer. But I do think it’s amazing how many pull-yourselves-up-by-your-bootstraps conservatives have turned into stoical fatalists all of a sudden. Now, me, I instinctively distrust any narrative that has heroes and villains, so I do personally think that running an orderly country with good preparedness had more to do with the result than the person in the big chair having a vagina – but then, I’m a bleeding-heart lefty who thinks that no one is all that responsible for what happens to them.
I’m not sure how it’s “egalitarian” to note that no one person can magically transform New Yorkers into Finns or the UK or US into Finland. If you believe that a politician could perform this feat, how exactly would they accomplish that? Also have no idea what bootstraps have to do with this, it appears you’re responding to someone else’s post.
You are right, but I do believe (complicated topic) that politicians matter.
You might agree or disagree with Merkel’s policies (immigration and nuclear power are my bone) but NO ONE can question her ability to grasp detail and have the gravitas to explain the situation to the public.
If results were not what mattered, I might agree with you. Explaining a situation and persuading people to view it the same way you do are two entirely different things. Also, I’d point out that people do consider WHO it is doing the explaining, to use your example of Angela Merkel without commenting on her immigration policy itself, people do consider how much her own life is impacted by her policies.
I was dealing with Covid as per the article.
And I wrote in my original comment:
“You might agree or disagree with Merkel’s policies (immigration and nuclear power are my bone) but NO ONE can question her ability to grasp detail and have the gravitas to explain the situation to the public.”
Most people don’t listen (or read) WHO proclamation, but they do listen to their elected leader.
Actually, you were the one who brought up immigration policies. Merkel’s ability to grasp and explain detail does not, as we can see in Germany today, necessarily persuade people to her way of thinking. My WHO comment does not refer to the World Health Organization. It refers to the person who is setting and explaining policies. In your Germany example, people do take into account how and whether Merkel’s immigration policies affect her life as they do the lives of Germans in general. And this isn’t limited to Merkel. You can find examples all over the world, particularly in the time of COVID. Shutting down restaurants by decree and then eating out yourself makes people consider how your policies affect your life as opposed to how they effect the lives of would be patrons as well as the owners and employees of closed restaurants.
I’m afraid this article shows just how poorly Covid 19 is being reported by our media. I pick out two glaring issues:
1. There appears to be a inverse correlation between flu deaths over the last 3 years and Covid 19 deaths. In the UK deaths flu deaths were below the long term average in Finland they were above. UK Covid deaths are high, Finland Covid deaths are low. This pattern repeats for multiple countries. This is luck, not judgement
2. The article congratulates Finland for closing it’s borders yet the EU criticised Trump when he did the same. Why is it OK for a socialist to close border but OK for those same socialists to shout “Racism” when a right winger does the same
The article is written by a columnist his personal opinion has NOTHING to do with EU’s criticism of Trump’s policies. So what is the connection?
I think it is interesting that two leaders take the same course of action, one is criticised at the time then ignored the other is celebrated. That tells you everything!
Interesting point. Perhaps the criticism of the US closing its borders is based in part on the vastly greater number of people trying to get into the US for one reason or another (business, family-related, tourism, college attendance, etc). If the US closes its borders it’s going to inconvenience and disappoint far greater numbers of people that Finland doing the same thing.
Good points, but they were not the arguments at the time.
At the time is was said to be an overreaction to Trump and inherently racist. I believe it was these comments that stop Johnson closing UK in the same way.
We now get articles like this congratulating left wing leaders for closing their borders and criticism of Johnson for not doing it fast enough but, as usual, Trump is ignored.
True, but the arguments don’t always reflect the real concerns. Particularly when it comes to Trump. Let’s just say that I’m unwilling to always credit an argument as the real concern. And there’s no doubt that the US closing its borders inconvenienced and disappointed far more people than Finland doing so. Not to mention the US being among the first to close borders. The fact that it became acceptable once other countries did it only reinforces my point.
Your argument is a false and shallow one. You don’t like Trump therefore Trump can only do bad things. The reverse also appears to be true. So your analysis of policy is based on your opinion of the person not the validity of their policy. It doesn’t matter who was first or who was inconvenienced (lets face it covid 19 response has been inconvenient for everyone!) the policy was either right or wrong. Just because Trump went first does not make him wrong and those “nice” socialist who went second right!
It is this mentality that leads people to flick through history to find small events to “cancel” historical figures. It also leads to a potentially very dangerous position were people who are deemed to be good do something bad. Think Aung San Suu Kyi as a classic example of both good a bad in the same person. Should we write her off as bad, or did she still do some very worthwhile things?
We need to take each policy or action on it’s merits. Johnson was wrong not to close our airports. He didn’t because people who didn’t like Trump called his actions “racist” and Johnson was afraid those same people would brand him “racist” as well. The UK suffered more deaths as a result. The knee jerk reaction of those who hate Trump and jsut critics his every move cause bad policy decisions in the UK leading to lose of life.
My point was the exact opposite. Policy should NOT be based on opinion of the person setting the policy. Try reading more carefully.
Criticism of the US for closing borders while not criticizing other countries for doing the same thing IS basing analyzing policy based on the person making the policy. If you can locate where I said Trump was wrong to close the borders, let me know. And yes it indeed does matter who was inconvenienced at least as far as the criticism goes. Not many people are trying to get into Finland even in non Covid times. The US closing its borders is hugely inconvenient to many many more people.
It is far easier and has less impacts for Finland to close its border as compared to the us
Called TDS
In comparisons with both Sweden and the UK, this article doesn’t address density of population, size of susceptible population – age and co-morbidities, size of minority populations in Northern Europe who have shown susceptibility to Covid because of Vit D deficiencies, the amount of incoming tourism and outgoing travel of citizens leading up to the pandemic, how care homes are organized and size of care home populations. I’m sure there are many more variables.
Indeed, the conceit that central authorities can control the virus might be just that: a conceit.
No obvious patterns emerge from international data. East Asian countries may have fared well, with Taiwan leading the pack, but Taiwan did not impose a harsh lockdown whereas South Korea did. Japan’s measure were also less harsh than those in Korea. Meanwhile the yo-yo pattern in COVID fatalities shows up everywhere. It is not obvious that government interventions are influencing those patterns for the better. Government may very well be do nothing more than reacting to phenomena it can’t control. It may even be exacerbating the situation.
From what I’ve read, the eastern countries have older people who are healthier and in the case of Japan, I’ve read that they have higher levels of Vitamin D. I wish we could see more information from the East. And yes, lockdowns have been inaccurate, blunt and devastating instruments.
The UK government has been very good at introducing new restrictions, just as Covid cases have begun to fall in the effected area. They can then claim victory for the continuing drop in cases without any evidence for true cause and effect. Correlation does not imply causation!
Population density, Innate immunity, healthier populations, better institutionalized care for the elderly. I’d like to see these looked at. Instead the only thing talked about are lockdowns and mask wearing. LOL. We might as well be living in the 18th century.
Every system/society/government has variables – as far as we can tell UK’s high death rate (vs Germany) is because the country closed down too late. And German GOV was able to quickly ramp up test and track.
Sweden vs Finland/Denmark/Norway is the same story – the country refused to close down and failed to test and track.
As you hint it´s more the timing of restrictions than the severity/force that is of importance.
Yes, German “lockdown” was closer to Sweden than UK.
Sweden has twice the population and the largest city of all 3. It would be interesting to see the mobility of each country. How much travel out of country for work and business. Also foreign travel statistics. The infatuation with lockdown and mask wearing is actually rather bizarre. It is assumed that these things are the most important. That isn’t proven. It would be interesting to look at elderly care and long term health care practices. As the disease particularly targets elderly and people in poor health it seems like countries with heathier populations and better elderly care would fare far better than those that don’t. I see almost no attempt to look at this.
Prevalence of single occupancy households, another variable.
And another variable…education. Finns achieve excellent standards of numeracy and literacy, approaching that of some Asian countries. Maybe a clue there as to why some countries fare better than others in a pandemic
Once again I see a culturally biased attempt to convey that women are somehow superior at handling this crisis (“Three of these top five nations are led by women …”). If we are going to celebrate nations that have truly crushed the virus, then why not start with CHINA? It is the epicenter of the pandemic and it is run by an authoritarian male-dominant regime, yet somehow this nation of over 1.4 billion people (including several of the largest, most densely populated urban areas in the world) has managed to keep the number of total infections below 100,000, and its economy is doing far better than anyone else. And by the way, no reported cases among any of its political leaders (as has been the norm in the West). Wanna tell a success story? Start with China (if you dare).
Spot on. China is the ultimate success story, given its population and population density. But enthusiasm will be rather measured in this case, because lauding China for its handling of the pandemic will imply a certain acceptance of its general model ““ and I don’t think there will be too many enthusiasts of that. For good reason, too.
This particular article is not about the virus per se. It is about the long-term tendency in our society to demonize men and call into question their leadership skills, which are of course informed by toxic/fragile masculinity. The underlying message is simple: elect a young-ish woman who comes from a same-sex household, and the sky is the limit.
Do you honestly believe those numbers coming out of China? They are about as reliable as Russian numbers, which is to say outright lies.
My old boss contacted me from China in, I think, late April. He isn’t in Wuhan. He said they hadn’t really locked down and that everything was more or less normal. As others have pointed out, there was already a degree of immunity in many Asian countries.
i have just watched another Ivor Cummins video in which he demonstrates that lockdowns and masks etc don’t work.
I think that you’d find that they did lockdown in Wuhan. Went early (but maybe not early enough, because then we’d be spared this plague) and hard. And the Chinese economy appears to have grown this year.
Lockdown was late January and they started opening up in March. Normal travel was resumed on April 8th. They resumed partying in September. LOL. https://www.itv.com/news/20…
hahah. Yeah. I knew this was coming.
China’s success story is almost certainly the result of pre-existing immunity among large pockets of the population. Coronavirus is an ongoing series of contagions originating in China’s contact with wildlife meat markets. Covid-related viruses have been passing around Asia quietly for years now, and several of them probably prepared the collective immune system to resist COVID-19. I might also mention San Francisco, which has an unaccountably low Covid death rate, likely because of pre-existing immunity.
This is a great point, no doubt, which needs to be factored into the conversation. There’s a very sobering article on The Japan Times, titled “The West should envy Japan’s COVID-19 response”. I highly recommend it (it’s a short read).
I point this out and the number one reply I get is China is lying. No facts to support this. This is all they have.
Finland population density — 18 people per square km… UK — 275… Is it perhaps easier to manage a pandemic in Finland than the UK? Also, apparently Scotland has managed the crisis statistically worse than England, but no mention of Sturgeon in this article. Perhaps because she is a nice good ‘progressive woman’
The UK could have a population density of one person per square mile and our politicians, quangos and state bodies (PHE, NHS etc) would still find a way to screw it up. As has been obvious for some decades, they are devoid of all competence or integrity.
Good luck to Sanna Marin. Since Thatcher left we have been governed by a succession of middle class white men, and one middle class white woman, whose policies and decisions have been an almost total failure. And things are about to get a whole lot worse with the Green New Deal and various other ruinous monstrosities.
Are you suggesting the race of a leader affects their abilities? That’s kind of controversial these days.
OK, compare Sweden with FInland/Norway/Denmark?
UK with Germany/Netherlands?
Yes. It’s really difficult to compare countries. Germany does seem to be a genuine success story. Tom Chivers wrote a good article on here, suggesting some of the reasons why that might be
It’s nonsensical to compare Finland and the UK’s performance in dealing with the pandemic, London alone has a far greater population than Finland, you could pick any person off the street and they could have had a similar outcome as Marin.
London has a greater population than Scotland, but Scotland has performed no better than England and, I believe, worse on some measures. So Finland would appear to have done something right.
As Annette says in the comment below.
The low population density countries Scotland and Sweden could be fairly compared. Scotland hard draconian lockdown, Sweden light touch.
Similar Covid outcome, Scotland more excess deaths over all (source ONS Europe 2020 excess deaths).
Sweden hard recession , Scotland about 4 times worse.
You can compare Sweden to Norway, and Sweden has done badly. Compare Scotland to Norway and Scotland is a disaster.
On many public health measures, Scotland has been one of the worst performers in Europe for a long time (fried Mars Bar, anyone?) So it’s hardly surprising that coronavirus has hit it hard.
Saunas
Uruguay has 25 Deaths per million, Finland 76, three time more, the government never enforce any look down, just recommendations (similar to the Swedish approach).
I wonder why the media is ignoring this success, is it because goes against the general rhetoric pro lock downs and government strong intervention limiting individual freedom?
It doesn’t help that the president, Mr Luis Lacalle Pou is from a centre right coalition, not a socialist, his gender doesn’t make him a good story either.
Just saying
I will start this comment by stating that by no measure do I believe that UK has had a “good” Pandemic. But how much of that is due to the failures of BJ as Prime Minister is another matter. And the same question must apply in converse to Ms Marin and the apparently rather better Finnish experience.
I genuinely wish I could understand the reasons for the apparently widely diverging numerical outcomes for Covid deaths across European countries.
It does seem to be a lot more complex than the individuals (or even political parties) in charge.
It is also more complicated than can be explained by simply trying to allow for factors such as population density, ethnicity, age distribution, prior health patterns etc etc etc.
The following article is interesting in concentrating particularly on Sweden (in so going it brings in other Nordic countries as a comparator as well as those in the Far East).
I am not sure if Unherd allows URLs in comments or references to alternative publications. Just search for
“We need to speak about Sweden more than ever By Kathy Gyngell”
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The article itself says very little, and as far as speaking about Sweden goes, the mouth says shut. Are you sure that you’re not just spruiking for Ivor C?
I think it is too early to make a final judgement on government(s) handling of C19. May be some countries got lucky and some (Italy) did not. Yes, there are national character differences that made a big difference – as of now- in the handling of crisis.
FT had an article about Sweden and C19, one Swedish political commentators was quoted that the Swedish PM came from union background and never cared much about policy making only about power. That is something he has in common with BoJo.
I think in case of C19 a serious politician that cares about policy and understand details would have performed than a BSer (BoJo). BSer can win election…but can they govern?
Marin is Finnish and they don’t do BSing.
Apparently constitutionally Sweden could not lock down by law… just for starters.
It can be noted that Finland has adopted a pragmatic land border control to Sweden, contrary to Norway´s ‘zero-covid’ approach. However, fully opened borders Fin-Swe for <1 week in september.
For a good review of the Nordic countries outcome, please read https://sebastianrushworth….
Not a very convincing article. All of Asia has low death numbers. This seems to imply some innate immunity already unless you buy into the theory of the effectiveness of masks. Even with large dense cities like Tokyo Japan only has seen 19 deaths per million. I don’t think you can put that down to masks. New Zealand, Finland, Norway all sparsely populated with far less international travel than the US, UK, France, or Spain.
Given the ethnic make-up of many Finns and Estonians, has anyone studied if the comparative success, compared with their Nordic and Germanic neighbours has a genetic or ethnic component? Before we run down the rabbit hole of ascribing better death rates in countries primarily down to their political leaders’ competence.