@Atanasio Lonchafinista te lo dedico. Es el fin.
Slutet på det svenska coronaexperimentet | SvD
The end of the Swedish corona experiment
The public health authority has been transformed from a commander into a troublesome little sibling. The Swedish corona exemption may thus be coming to an end, exactly five years after the government dumped another deviation - the Swedish refugee policy.
"We have seen this dramatic increase in a very short time and we must act on that reality," said Stefan Löfven.
The Swedish exception was over and the Prime Minister presented the proposals that would make Sweden a country like any other. It was November 24, 2015 and the subject was Swedish refugee reception.
But Löfven could have used exactly the same word on Monday - the fateful mood was the same - when he told about the "eight rule" which is the government's new weapon against the corona. It is a ban on crowds which, according to the Prime Minister, "are unparalleled in modern times".
Maybe someone in Löfven's vicinity should have thought of the date. The eight rule will enter into force on Tuesday, November 24, the doomsday for Swedish exceptions.
"Even Sweden is abandoning the Swedish model", the Washington Post begins on Wednesday with an article about what is happening in Sweden right now.
The press conference five years ago has been remembered not only for its content but also for the Deputy Prime Minister's crying. She never did, but Åsa Romson's voice broke when she said she had come to the conclusion that you still have to "do something".
And "something" meant - that was at least the message - that the Swedish rules for refugee reception would now be at "the EU's minimum level". From best in class to worst, from the Green Party's point of view.
Of course, the refugee crisis is very different from the corona crisis. The corona issue is not about Sweden's stated goals differing from other countries. The difference lies in the decision model, and in the decisions it has led to.
But in both cases, there is a Swedish line that clearly deviates from our immediate surroundings. A direction that the government and quite a few Swedes are proud of - but which is also sharply questioned in Sweden and in other countries.
"We will listen to the expert authorities," the ministers themselves say.
In refugee policy, it was about human values that were long considered inviolable, perhaps in line with the classic self-image of Sweden as a "humanitarian superpower". In the corona issue, supporters instead associate with other high values, especially scientific rationalism.
Already at the beginning of March, I heard a key person in the Government Offices describe how the Swedish corona strategy is based on science and competence in the authorities. And that, unlike the order in many other countries, it keeps the government - the politicians - and their sometimes populist impulses short.
"We will listen to the expert authorities," the ministers themselves say. The most important expert authority is the Public Health Agency, and the agency's recommendations have been the core of the Swedish method for responding to the corona pandemic. At least that was the case initially. "We are the ones holding the baton," FHM's CEO Johan Carlson explained to DN in mid-March.
And this is how Stefan Löfven answered on March 11 the question of whether it could be relevant to stop major events in Sweden: “We make our decisions according to what our expert authorities say. If there is such a recommendation, we are prepared to make those decisions ”.
The site Altinget has told how FHM this spring demanded - and was enrolled in the government's temporary crisis team - that expert authorities' assessment should be "of decisive importance".
The Swedish corona strategy has been a world first, ever since the outside world first noticed that Sweden chose more cautious measures than other countries. Of course, the reporting was negatively colored by the fact that the death toll in Sweden was dramatically higher than in our Nordic neighbors, who chose harsher variants. Sweden, together with Belarus, was alone in Europe on a laissez-faire line, writes the Washington Post.
But there has also been a curiosity in the country differently - was another way than closure possible? Was the Swedish model perhaps more rational, less alarmist / populist?
Some antiestéticatures in Sweden can be described as a triumph for the Swedish strategy and the Swedish Public Health Agency. This spring, it was considered controversial that Sweden did not close the schools, now during the second wave many ***ow that example.
But something has happened to the relationship between government and government. The eight rule - which is thus "unparalleled" - was not a proposal from the expert authority. State epidemiologist Anders Tegnell said in SR's Studio one that "there has been no major dialogue". He continued: "This is the government's decision when it comes to how many are allowed to gather, it is not we who put our foot down."
The baton was gone and Tegnell also managed to damage the eight rule by - contrary to the government's idea - claiming that it does not apply to cinemas. The master of the spring was now transformed into defiant little siblings.
The expert authority, which in the spring ruled through a request - a formal request - to the government, has been reduced to a reference body. The same was true of the proposal to ban alcohol serving after 10 pm.
Also from within the government, one can now hear a certain distancing from FHM, when it comes to how the testing - too late and too narrow and too little - was carried out this spring.
Still, it is probably above all the Public Health Agency's missed forecasts that create frustration in the government. Everything got much worse this spring than FHM thought. Everything is much worse now than FHM has thought. According to Anders Tegnell, Sweden would not even be hit by a second wave. On Wednesday, the authority reported 96 new deaths.
Incorrect predictions make the government appear ignorant and, in the worst case, careless. During the autumn, a number of restrictions have already been eased before they are now forced to tighten the throttle again.
It may seem like a mistake, but none of the ministers admitted any of these during Monday's press conference. The Löfven government did not do so after 24 November 2015 either. They had simply corrected the unsustainable refugee policy of the bourgeoisie.
