I didn’t really get that impression from Coyne’s post, but he was making the broader point about the way the US government treats religious services as “essential”.
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I don’t think they struggled and then suddenly remembered what the Bible says. It came quite easily and automatically to their minds. (Notice that I also said that millions made their decision in this way—while tens or even hundreds of millions of religious people simply went along with what their peers were doing. That’s how people typically behave with all sorts of decisions.)
I’ve spent many years in the evangelical world and find it very easy to believe. Obeying the laws of the land (as clearly ordained by God) is taught in churches from an early age. I could even cite various Bible memorization programs used in countless churches (some starting at age 2 or 3) which include:
Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2 Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.
– Romans 13:1-2
Moreover, I’ve been hearing this Bible passage quoted by countless radio and TV preachers for the past several Sundays. Yes, I would say that this motivation for social distancing is very common among “religious people”, especially for millions of American evangelicals.
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Hi everyone,
Speaking as a Catholic, I’d like to defend the Swedes. Here’s why.
First, we’re all undertaking a dangerous social experiment here: we’ve basically stopped the wheels of capitalism turning worldwide, for all but a few essential services, for a period of several weeks, and it looks like there’ll be rolling lockdowns over the next few months. And if you think we can bounce back with a V-shaped recovery, then you are deluding yourself. The consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic will be felt for a generation, just as they were with the Great Depression. Here’s financial advisor Danielle DiMartino-Booth being interviewed by Patrick Bet-David (10-minute video):
Things will never be the same again. There will be thousands and thousands of small business closures, thousands and thousands of suicides and millions of wrecked lives, because of the economic disruption caused by this pandemic. It will take a long time before people feel confident enough about their lives (and their money) to hop on a plane and fly overseas, or stay at a three-star hotel for the weekend, or eat at a nice restaurant, or shop for fancy clothes - the little things that provide jobs for millions of people in America. In the meantime, millions of people have lost their income. People are HURTING. And, I might add, many people who are sick from other illnesses are finding it hard to get medical treatment.
In case you’re still thinking that life can rebound to normal after the pandemic, ponder this. In 1969, NASA sent men to the moon with minuscule computer resources. They had to use human calculators, for heaven’s sake. Now, in 2020, even with supercomputers at its disposal, NASA is no longer able to send men back to the moon. Why? It’s lost too many skilled people. When skilled people disappear and jobs disappear, things that were possible before now become impossible. That’s how it will be with the global economy.
So why are we making this huge sacrifice? Supposedly, it’s meant to save lives: if we do nothing, millions will die, whereas if we do something, only a few tens of thousands will. At least, that’s what we were told. But while I was reading an article by Ross Clark in the “U.S. Spectator” this morning, I came across a link to a leaked Homeland Security report [note: I’ve sent a note to Snopes asking if it’s genuine and am awaiting results, but I presume it is, if an American magazine is quoting from it], projecting the total number of deaths in the U.S. under various scenarios, including the do-nothing option (unmitigated) and a “Steady State” option (school closures until summer, 25 % of people teleworking, and some social distancing) followed by a 30-day shelter-in-place scenario. Guess what? Under the former policy, 300,000 people will eventually die, while under the latter, it’s “only” 200,000. Not much difference. Saving 100,000 American lives by ruining tens of millions of lives and imperiling the very future of global capitalism does not sound like a very intelligent policy to me.
Of course, the reply will be that the latter option will free up more ventilators. But that assumes that people who are severely ill with the virus should go to hospital in the first place. Why do we keep assuming that everyone has to die in hospital? What if the government simply told people who were sick with the virus to stay home? That would solve the ventilator problem. Severe cases would suffer for a week, with many thousands of them struggling to breathe from pneumonia before passing away - but society would survive. And that’s more important. Life has to go on.
The Swedes realize this. And they’re not foolish: many of them are already practicing social distancing anyway, and elderly people in Sweden are much less likely to live with people from younger generations, as they’re highly individualistic. Also, Sweden’s population density is low, and Stockholm is a lot less crowded than London. But the important thing is that businesses are still open. Will American capitalism go under? I don’t know. But Swedish capitalism won’t. (Sweden, by the way, is far less socialist than most of its fans think.)
In any case, there’s a vital reason why the Swedish experiment has to go ahead. A few weeks ago, there was a dispute within the British government as to whether it should go ahead with a full lockdown or try to build up herd immunity instead, as some experts were urging. After Prime Minister Boris Johnson got ill and nearly died from the virus, the whole country swung behind a lockdown. But we still don’t know if that’s the best way to go, long-term. Perhaps building up herd immunity would be a better idea. To settle the matter, we need a control group which tries out that experiment. That control group is Sweden. If any country can make it work, Sweden can. If it fails in Sweden, then we’ll know in future that lockdowns are better. In any case, Sweden is making a vital contribution to scientific knowledge, and I would strongly urge them to stick to their guns until the end of June, by which time they should have acquired herd immunity.
Well, the Swedes are implementing social distancing now, so I’m not sure you point. They found that approach did not work, so they stopped it.
I don’t think there’s been any large shift in the Coronavirus policies in Sweden. The limit on gatherings went from a maximum of 500 people down to 50 and there’s now a ban in place against visiting nursing homes - that’s pretty much it. Otherwise, we have the same recommendations on social distancing we’ve had from the start.
It’s clear by now that we’ve failed to protect the elderly. A large part of our nursing homes (probably at least a 3rd) have been infected. The ban against visits is fine but staff has been insufficiently tested and protective gear is in short supply. This failure probably accounts for the higher death rates in Sweden as compared to our neighbours in Norway and Denmark - about 90% of the people who have died were over 70 years old.
I don’t think this should necessarily be taken to mean that the general policy has been wrong - the number of cases per 1 million people is basically the same in Sweden, Norway and Denmark. It’s the specific measures concerning the elderly that have failed and I’m sure there will be a lot of changes made in the near future.
On the positive side, according to the latest data I could find not a single Corona-related death has occured in the under 20 age group and only 19 people under the age of 50 have died (out of a total of 1 333 deaths). This can be seen as some vindication for the decision to keep primary and pre-schools open. Both Norway and Denmark have recently decided to re-open the schools.
There’s no one preventing you from getting out and about. You’re just picking a model you want to be correct.
That’s quite a straw man. My reply, as a virologist, is that flattening the curve gets us closer to both treatments and vaccines. Interesting that you ignored that.
We’ve seen that in Italy, remember? And pretending that we are only concerned about ventilators, without mentioning vaccines/treatments, is a predictable, completely political straw man.
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It’s not that simple. The livelihoods of tens of millions of Americans will be equally ruined if we let COVID19 run rampant. That is because our economy cannot absorb the overwhelming hit to the health care system that would come with millions of hospitalizations, hundreds of thousands (or more) deaths, and even the costs associated with tens or hundreds of millions of outpatient visits, many of which will not be covered by any sort of insurance.
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This image captured the mindset of those who don’t understand the problem:
These are the same people who scream at an airline pilot “why are you making as emergency landing?? MY wing of the plane isn’t on fire!” 
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People who either don’t understand exponential functions, or who are tribally/politically motivated not to.
Where did you find that graph? May I repost it?
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So what?
That looks like the worst sort of cherry-picking to me. The deaths per million tell a very different story:
Sweden: 139
Norway: 30
Denmark: 58
This disparity is explained by lower testing rates in Sweden:
Sweden: 7387
Norway: 25130
Denmark: 15024 (tests per million)
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I saw it posted at ATBC yesterday. The original came from ??? ATBC seems down right now for some reason. Please repost away. 
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Your Marie Antoinette proposal also is blind to evolutionary consequences.
By leaving the most severely affected people at home, they are giving massive doses of more pathogenic variants to those who live with them, so you’re artificially selecting for higher pathogenicity.
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If cases are defined as laboratory-confirmed cases then the number will obviously be affected by the amount of testing. How much this has affected the numbers in this instance will hopefully be revealed as Sweden ramps up the testing. I don’t see, however, how focusing on the deaths per million is any less cherry-picking.
We know that different countries count the deaths in different ways. Some countries only count deaths occurring in hospitals while others include deaths in nursing homes. There may also be a significant number of people dying in their homes that have not been counted as Corona-related deaths. Even if the numbers could be trusted as accurate, they still wouldn’t tell us the full story. Since we know that deaths occur disproportionately within the 70+ age group, the numbers would probably tell us more about how well a country has succeeded in protecting their nursing homes than how well they have managed to stop the virus from spreading in society at large.
I think it’s far too early to make any definitive assessment of the various Coronavirus response schemes. There’s a good chance that we’ll see a second wave when societies start opening up and what will the response be then? Going right back to a hard lockdown would be a nightmare. If we don’t see any drastic change to the trends in Sweden, I wouldn’t be surprised if more countries adopted approaches similar to Sweden since they have a better chance of being sustainable over time. We’ll see.
It’s less subject to variation and misidentification.
I’m not saying they do tell the full story; however, together they support my hypothesis and do not support yours. I’m saying that you are cherry-picking.
Why wouldn’t the prevalence in nursing homes tell us how a society is preventing viral spread in society at large?
I don’t.
I predict that the societies that did better jobs the first time will do better jobs the second time. It’s all about testing.
We already have seen; the differences between US states make it very clear.
So the number of deaths is likely to deviate less from reality than the number of cases? Can you explain how you did this assessment?
What exactly is your hypothesis? Still not convinced you’re not cherry-picking.
Nursing homes are populated by the people who are the most vulnerable to the virus. If a greater part of these nursing homes have been infected in one country than is the case in another country, then this would have an impact on the comparative numbers. If you’re arguing that Norway having 4.6 times less reported deaths per million than Sweden is likely because they have 4.6 times fewer actual cases in total, how do you support that claim?
The latest number I could find for the percentage of tested people showing up as Corona positive in Sweden is 2.5%. If we tested people in Sweden up to the same level as Norway it seems extremely unlikely that we would get anywhere near a 4.6 times difference in total cases.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. You still need to explain how you’ve arrived at the conclusion that the reported relative number of deaths are more reliable than the reported relative number of cases.
OK. I guess that settles it.
I would challenge that prediction. Specifically, I would predict that countries who have done poorly when it comes to testing (like Sweden) will do better the next time around.
If you’re seriously comparing the response of states like Florida and Mississippi to that of Sweden, there’s probably one or two things you’re missing. Did you read my first post in this thread?
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Because people who die are more likely to have been tested and/or clinically evaluated–in every society.
Sweden made a mistake. Not as bad as the US one.
If. But is that the case?
It depends on whom one is testing.
I don’t think there’s a correlation. I am absolutely certain that the US federal government, which has done an exceedingly poor job, will not learn from any of the many mistakes it has made.
How did you take my “the differences between US states” to be a comparison with Sweden?
And yet we know for a fact that different countries have different levels of reporting when it comes to Corona-related deaths in nursing homes. Are you just going to ignore that?
Too imprecise. What exactly was the mistake? The insufficient testing and protective measures for key groups (like nursing home staff) is an obvious mistake - but the main criticism against Sweden has been the social distancing policies. Was keeping primary and pre-schools open a mistake? Was keeping shops and restaurants open a mistake? If you say yes, how do you know?
Do you believe it’s possible that the recommendations from the Swedish Public Health Authority on social distancing were basically sound and that if the particular mistakes concerning the nursing homes are corrected, we might have a viable Coronavirus response going forward? If you’ve excluded this possibility, can you explain how?
I’ve only seen general comments that Norway does more testing in nursing homes and that they have less problems with infections there but I don’t have any numbers.
Just going by the numbers I have. If you have better ones, I’m all ears (or eyes).
The Swedish authorities are completely committed to increasing testing and to do an overhaul of the protective policies in the nursing homes. There has been no attempt to hide this failure.
I speculated that if the trend lines in Sweden don’t deteriorate, that some countries might adopt similar policies to Sweden in response to a possible second wave of infections rather than going back to lockdown. I ended with a “we’ll see”. You responded “We already have seen; the differences between US states make it very clear.” If this wasn’t an attempt to compare the less successful US states to Sweden, then what was the point of bringing the US states into the conversation?
It’s way past my bedtime over here, will have to pick this up tomorrow. Goodnight.
I don’t think it’s doing that. I just think it’s not very familiar with how to manage a pandemic, and the response from both the government and the people has resulted in many avoidable deaths.
It was done during the Spanish Flu pandemic. Social distancing proved extremely effective, though it frayed social bonds and people record bouts of intense loneliness.
But we can make reasonable predictions based on the economic performance of populations which practiced social distancing during the Spanish Flu.
Meanwhile in the US, you can hear sentiments such as these.
Let’s start with things really critical to the nation. Schools are a very appetizing opportunity. I just saw a nice piece in the Lancet arguing that the opening of schools may only cost us 2-3% in terms of total mortality. Any life is a life lost, but to get every child back into school where they’re safely being educated, being fed, and making the most out of their lives with a theoretical risk on the backside — it might be a trade-off some folks would consider.
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No. Unlike you, I’m looking at all the data.
Sorry.
Why did you ask the question if you already knew the answer?
Probably, on the basis of what we have learned about the proportion of asymptomatic cases.
I don’t see those as separate. Are you really suggesting that people in nursing homes are not part of society? Because what you wrote comes off that way to me.
That’s refreshing. Can we trade authorities with you?
Because the comparisons and contrasts between them are better controlled. We also have very good data from the 1918 epidemic; the article below highlights a single pair. What’s your control country for Sweden?
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And what particular data shows you that deaths per million is a more reliable measure than cases per million?
Because I wanted your answer - I already knew mine.
Could a second wave of infections change that assessment. If not, why not?
You’re not really answering my question. Could the Swedish social distancing scheme together with a stringent regime of testing and protective measures for high risk groups (mainly the elderly) be a viable Coronavirus response? If not, why not?
Nah, you’ll have to get your own. I hear you have an election coming up.
A country just like Sweden but which went into a hard lockdown? I don’t have one. Neither, I suspect, do you. Wouldn’t that be a problem for you, too? What exactly does the comparison between different US states tell you about the Swedish response?
About the article: has anyone contested the value of social distancing? I certainly haven’t - and neither have the people responsible for the Swedish Corona response. That’s why Sweden is doing social distancing. “Flattening the curve” is one of the main objectives of the Swedish policy - as, I guess, is the case most everywhere.