Northern Europe during Pandemic -- Summers 2020 & 2021 & onwards

[Wotname]

This explains it better than me.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number

[Jonte]

Originally Posted by Wotname

This explains it better than me.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number

Thank you for the info. The R- number here in Sweden has been 1.4 that's why they thought it was a good thing.

[GordMay]

The "R0" of a disease is equal to the number of additional infections a typical case will cause before they recover. It specifically applies to a population of people, who were previously free of infection, and haven’t been vaccinated.
Importantly, a disease’s R0 value only applies when everyone in a population is completely vulnerable to the disease. This means:
no one has been vaccinated
no one has had the disease before
there’s no way to control the spread of the disease
If the average R0 in the population is greater than 1, the infection will spread exponentially.

If R0 is less than 1, the infection will spread only slowly, and it will eventually die out. The higher the value of R0, the faster an epidemic will progress.
R0 is estimated from data collected in the field and entered into mathematical models. The estimated value depends on the model used and the data that inform it.
R0 can be misrepresented, misinterpreted, and misapplied in a variety of ways that distort the metric’s true meaning and value. Because of these various sources of confusion, R0 must be applied and discussed with caution in research and practice. This epidemiologic construct will only remain valuable and relevant when used and interpreted correctly.

The effective reproduction number, Re, sometimes also called Rt, is the number of people in a population who can be infected by an individual at any specific time. Re changes as the population becomes increasingly immunized, either by individual immunity following infection, or by vaccination, and also as people die.

“Epidemic theory (effective & basic reproduction numbers, epidemic thresholds) & techniques for analysis of infectious disease data (construction & use of epidemic curves, generation numbers, exceptional reporting & identification of significant clusters)”
This page covers the basic principles of epidemic theory ➥ https://www.healthknowledge.org.uk/p...pidemic-theory

[tp12]

Originally Posted by Wotname

This explains it better than me.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number

I think your explanation was good. This is a quote from that definition:

....of an infection can be thought of as the expected number of cases directly generated by one case in a population where all individuals are susceptible to infection.

So if R = 1 then 1 infected person will infect one other person. This represents a steady and linear growth of infection numbers. If it was 2 then it would be spreading by two people per person infected which is exponential growth to the power of 2.


An R value <1 indicates that 1 person is infecting less than one person and therefore the rate of infection is slowing. Overall numbers are still increasing. The worldometer data doesn't seem to back this up on a trend basis understanding that an R value for a particular day may not reflect the overall trend.


Which is why I was thinking that we may be looking at two different sets of data.

[tp12]

Originally Posted by Jonte

Thank you for the info. The R- number here in Sweden has been 1.4 that's why they thought it was a good thing.

An R value of 1.4 indicates that the rate of infections is 1 to the power of 1.4. Meaning that each person infected is infecting 1.4 people. This is exponential growth with the exponent being 1.4


This means the virus is still not contained and is something to be concerned about. Certainly not indicating that any measures taken are working.

[Jonte]

Originally Posted by tp12

An R value of 1.4 indicates that the rate of infections is 1 to the power of 1.4. Meaning that each person infected is infecting 1.4 people. This is exponential growth with the exponent being 1.4


This means the virus is still not contained and is something to be concerned about. Certainly not indicating that any measures taken are working.

We can only hope the number will continue to drop. They say we can be dealing Whit this a year or more. So we keep fingers crossed.

[tp12]

Originally Posted by Jonte

We can only hope the number will continue to drop. They say we can be dealing Whit this a year or more. So we keep fingers crossed.

When you say the number will continue to drop are you referring to the R number? Because the current R number means infections and therefore deaths are increasing exponentially.


Do you have any data you're referring to regarding the R number?

[Jonte]

Originally Posted by tp12

When you say the number will continue to drop are you referring to the R number? Because the current R number means infections and therefore deaths are increasing exponentially.


Do you have any data you're referring to regarding the R number?

Yes I mean the R-number. It's gone from 1.4 to 0.85 so the experts think that good. I do believe what they say. I can't copy grafik from local and national news,i don't how. SVT nyheter is a app but only in Swedish I think if you like to watch. I'm sorry that I can't help Whit the grafiks.

[tp12]

Originally Posted by Jonte

Yes I mean the R-number. It's gone from 1.4 to 0.85 so the experts think that good. I do believe what they say. I can't copy grafik from local and national news,i don't how. SVT nyheter is a app but only in Swedish I think if you like to watch. I'm sorry that I can't help Whit the grafiks.

No worries, mate, all good. I'm not seeing that in the worldometers data but I think this confirms we're talking about two different data sets.

[Jonte]

OK, I tried to copy the grafik only came out numbers all over screen. But it doesn't matter now. Things are what they are.

[tp12]

Originally Posted by Jonte

OK, I tried to copy the grafik only came out numbers all over screen. But it doesn't matter now. Things are what they are.

It's all good, thank you for looking.


I was just looking for this other source of data that seems to contradict worldometers because it might have an explanation of its method to enable a contrast against worldometers. So far, I'd have to say that the positivity regarding Sweden's approach is misplaced and defies the numbers that we're seeing. It has been held up as an example of how to do things better regarding tackling the virus but that doesn't seem to stack up against what we know, especially regarding immunity, about the virus and the numbers.

[Jonte]

Åtgärderna har haft effekt”

Enligt*Folkhälsomyndighetens beräkningar*låg R-talet på 1,4 i Sverige i början av april. Från 10 till 20 april studsade siffran runt 1,0, och sedan 21 april har den legat konstant under. Det senaste R-talet i rapporten är från 25 april och ligger på 0,85.

I made it but in Swedish [emoji23]

[Jonte]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Sail-in restaurants in Finland booming:


https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-11324677


I'm still in Denmark, but it looks like the boating season in Finland has started off with a bang. Social distancing on docks is recommended.

It looks about same in Sweden. There open but you should keep distance in public places. Maybe there will be some sailing for you after all. Just wait for the Finnish border to open.

[barnakiel]

Nobody, except maybe some Asian or African nations, knew what to do. Neither sars, mers nor ebola hit EU nor US. We do not have any relevant recent emotions to base our actions in.



Swedes did not have any idea of what to do, nor did Trump, Johnson or Merkele. They all took chances, and acted in ways most appropriate to getting re-elected.


All the locking down was not done to save your health. It was done to minimize broad and deep impact on the hospital systems in each country. If the hospital systems collapse, the politicians are out of their jobs. They do all they can to avoid such a situation.



Post-factum, we can say, maybe in a year: "Swedes were right". But this kind of post factum knowledge is worth nothing. And what is good for a wee nation of Swedes, already isolated before any isolation policies, will likely be of little use for the city of Tokyo.


Different situations, different populations, different strokes.



There are always lessons for those who seek learning. But "Swedes were right" is definitely not one of the lessons.


BTW The fun fact: Spain went into a full lock down with hardly 10k cases. Spain is lifting the lock down with over 75k cases. So stop thinking about I, me, and mine. They did not do it for you. They did what they thought best to keep the system going.



Swedes or not.



Cheers,
b.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by tp12

. . . Sweden is getting absolutely smashed by that metric. It's spin to suggest it's doing well despite the significant numbers of deaths they've had relative to their neighbours. It beggars belief.

Sweden getting "smashed"? What are you smoking? Half of ICU beds are empty in Sweden. Hospitalizations are decreasing. Deaths are flat. Cumulative deaths are at about 1.5x compared to a bad flu year. "Smashed"?

In Finland they are alarmed that there are so few deaths -- it means that the end of the epidemic is far away. There is a growing opinion among the health authorities of the Nordic countries that Sweden has done the best job in the Nordics of getting the policy right, and evidence of that is that both Denmark and Finland are now moving towards the Swedish model. In fact a friend of mine from the Danish Ministry of Health was on board my boat today and expressed that opinion.

Everyone will get it, and about the same number of people will die everywhere. It's just a question of how fast it goes.

You don't want it to go so fast that health care systems are overwhelmed. That is the expressly stated goal of social distancing measures. Going much slower than what the health care system can handle will not save lives; it will merely prolong the agony. And the economic destruction.

By that measure Sweden may be going too slowly, not too fast. For all the carnage in Italy, the Italians may end up having the best outcome of all -- having largely gotten it over with.