- my statistics professor
What did she mean? That if the impact of a treatment is so difficult to discern that you're looking at some statistic to judge it the treatment probably is not effective.
The fact that Sweden doesn't stand out as a horror show relative to everyone else is indicative, as well as places with strict enforcement of lockdown rules. Nobody stands out
https://tinyurl.com/sweden-vs-nordic-covid
https://tinyurl.com/sweden-vs-nordic-cumulative
If you only look at the first year of the `sweden-vs-nordic-covid` link it looks pretty bad for Sweden, but if you extend it out, Finland and Norway traded early reduced mortality for later increased mortality.
This suggests Covid is highly transmissible, and restrictive policies just shift mortality out a little bit, not reduce it. Sure it's great to save lives, but at what cost to society? You need to balance mental health, the needs of children for social and educational development, and the economy.
You can't stop the world because people who are old or very sick are dying, that's nature, we're all subject to the same rules. You always need to balance the societal harm potential against the benefit, and with Covid our leaders seem to have forgotten that in many places.
Extend the timeline out as much as you want. Sweden still has a lot more cumulative dead per capita. And you are simply lying that Norway had increased fatalities and so just shifted it in time. The gap between Sweden and Norway slightly increased by May 2023.
Spare me your opinions and standard talking points after seeing data contradicting Sweden was some shining star of stellar policies due to GBD principles. A lot of our "leaders" like DeSantis forgot that pretending your expert in things you know nothing about and finding the most partisan hack doc you can for Surgeon General doesn't mean you're making correct decisions.
We could also talk about morbidity but that would make your weak argument even worse. After all, quality of life is SO important during the limited lockdown times but let's not measure significant decreased qualify of life for millions of Americans from Long COVID. And lets all hope there isn't significant subclinical issues like increased thromboembolic activity (frequently seen post-COVID) that will rear its head later.