Daily: Sweden’s Corona gamble

While the rest of Europe locked down, Sweden took a different and much looser path on dealing with COVID. Is their controversial approach working? Is Sweden right to measure itself against a longer-term tally of suffering caused by the virus’s economic consequences, and not just the immediate death toll? Andrew Brown, author of Fishing in Utopia: Sweden and the Future that Disappeared talks to Ros Taylor about the biggest COVID gamble in Europe. 

• “There’s a view that everyone is pursuing the Swedish strategy, whether they know it or not.”
• “This is a fairly brutal way of doing it. But Sweden’s view is that the facts are brutal.” 
• “Swedish opinion is like a shoal of herring. They all head in the same direction together – but that direction can change suddenly.”
• “The Swedish government can be extremely bossy – but part of the technique of social control was to deny that it existed.”

Presented by Ros Taylor. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producer Jacob Archbold. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Alex Rees. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production. 

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