Sweden Avoided a ‘Pingdemic’. Why Couldn’t We?

A reader of the Daily Sceptic has written a guest post comparing the U.K.'s enthusiastic, money-no-object embrace of a contact-tracing app with the much more cautious approach of Sweden. Result? No 'pingdemic' in Sweden.

3 min read

A reader, who wishes to remain anonymous, has sent the following post, comparing Britain’s enthusiastic embrace of a contact-tracing app with Sweden’s more considered approach.

As the U.K.’s ‘pingdemic’ spreads ever wider, wreaking havoc on hospitals, care homes, schools, supermarkets, and the economy, one person at least might afford himself a wry smile.

In the early months of the pandemic, many Swedish epidemiologists, virologists and other medical specialists implored their Prime Minister Stefan Löfven and Health Minister Lena Hallengren to build a contact-tracing app. Tech companies fell over themselves to claim they had the necessary expertise to do just that. Development actually got underway, but once state epidemiologist Dr Anders Tegnell and his team had evaluated the viability of such an app and come to the view it would cause excessive fear and large-scale disruption, Löfven was talked out of it and all work ceased.

In an interview on Swedish Television in May of last year, Tegnell said he didn’t think the idea of an app had been “properly thought through'” (He could have said the same of a great deal else of U.K. pandemic decision-making and implementation). He foresaw large numbers of ‘pings’ being generated and vast resources being expended on staffing and testing. Many people would be worried for no good reason and hospitals and care homes would come under more pressure as staff would have to self-isolate. He also questioned whether a distance as great as two metres for a period as short as 15 minutes were appropriate parameters.

Tellingly, when asked: “Wouldn’t it be worthwhile at least in controlling the spread of infections?”, he replied: “Few of the contacts (of a person with a positive test result) would be infected. For every person ill with Covid, I would reckon about 30 healthy people would be urged to self-isolate unnecessarily.”

Is there any evidence that the U.K. Government’s much-vaunted contact-tracing NHS COVID-19 App, run by NHS Test and Trace, has nevertheless been successful? According to politicians of all parties and medics of many disciplines, the answer is a resounding no.

Referring to the current £37 billion projected cost of Dido Harding’s test and trace operation, Lord Macpherson, who was Permanent Secretary at the Treasury from 2005 to 2016 and worked on 33 Budgets and 20 Spending Reviews, went so far as to say: “This wins the prize for the most wasteful and inept public spending programme of all time.”

To paraphrase Tegnell’s famous commentary on Sweden rejecting a large-scale lockdown of society: “It was as if the world had gone mad about contact-tracing apps, and everything we needed to consider was forgotten. The cases became too many and the political pressure got too strong. And then Sweden stood there rather alone.”

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55 Comments
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SomersetHoops
SomersetHoops
5 years ago

Tegnell agreed, Sweden made the same mistake as us over care homes which accounted for a large proportion of their deaths initially, but since then he seems to have got most things right. Unlike the UK, where we seem to have got most things wrong. By accepting that people should be responsible for their own safety and that most young fit people would only be mildly effected by the virus, seems to have improved mass immunity in Sweden and now their figures for deaths and hospitalisations caused by Covid-19 are some of the lowest.

Tegnell’s opinion about test and trace systems are spot-on as has been proven here, yet still our incompetent government haven’t got the guts to admit they were stupid and wrong about it and still persist in wasting billions on it despite the facts being crystal clear to anyone but them.

J Pearce
J Pearce
5 years ago

Just found this and highlighted a few sentences. The second highlighted sentence says it all for me!

blob:https://dailysceptic.org/5b485ea5-0497-4c32-b942-8ded4c8dff94

J Pearce
J Pearce
5 years ago
Reply to  J Pearce

Apologies it won’t let me paste!

TheBigman
TheBigman
5 years ago

They are traced in other ways. Such as a large uptake in chipping of employees.

marebobowl
marebobowl
5 years ago

At what point will this government and their scientific advisors be investigated for the multiple costly mistakes they made?

Epi
Epi
5 years ago

Three cheers for SWEDEN hip hip …….. !

I am Spartacas
I am Spartacas
5 years ago

Lets face it … we are run by politicians in this country who are as thick as shit – most are only where they are because of the old boy network that is as powerful now as it ever was and far too many are in politics simply to line their own pockets … usually at our cost.

isobar
isobar
5 years ago
Reply to  I am Spartacas

I think that you are being unkind to shit. At least you can flush that away, pity that we can’t do that with the fat pig dictator and his cronies!

huxleypiggles
huxleypiggles
5 years ago
Reply to  I am Spartacas

Irrelevant.

British politicians are being run from a central command – probably Switzerland.

Our parliamen comprises the greatest bunch of COWARDS ever to own British passports.

Scum.

Utter scum.

artfelix
artfelix
5 years ago

Look like the French have brought in the passport for 12-17 year olds. That seems to me a massive tactical blunder. There are plenty of adults who will grit their teeth and take their chances with themselves to save their jobs, but when you ask them to put their kids in the firing line when there is zero risk from Covid for them? I expect la merde va frapper le ventilateur. The French media might have to claim there were 22,000 on the streets of Paris this time.

NonCompliant
NonCompliant
5 years ago

As Mark Dolan said on GB News last night…. Ditch the App, it’s crap !!

peyrole
peyrole
5 years ago

Wouldn’t it be nice if we all had government ministers and advisors like this.
Instead Javid grovels as he is criticised for saying we shouldn’t ‘cower’ in the face of covid.
”Like many, I have lost loved ones to this awful virus and would never minimise its impact.”
Now I have lost count of the number of people who claim to have lost loved ones. With about 120K deaths reported ‘with’ covid, and conservatively estimated that at least 50% of these were nothing whatsoever to do with the virus; there must be many people in the media, politics, business, NGOs. non-profits, LAs etc etc who are closely related to those 60K people. Perhaps their immune systems were weakened by generations of inbreeding?
Or perhaps its just a load of bollocks!
In the meantime the French dictator is sunning himself in the Pacific on a slow boat back from Tokyo. He passes messages that he hopes everyone will be vaccinated by the time he gets back. The majority of France hopes he never gets back!

Annie
Annie
5 years ago
Reply to  peyrole

To lose one covvisnuffit may be accounted a misfortune. To lose more than one looks like mendacity.

huxleypiggles
huxleypiggles
5 years ago

I couldn’t read it all.

Toby, dear chap, the C1984 has FA to do with health and looking after people.

This is the Great Cull after which comes the Great Reset.

Get a grip man while you still have a position.

Fuckin hell.

TheyLiveAndWeLockdown
TheyLiveAndWeLockdown
5 years ago
Reply to  huxleypiggles

total conspiracy theory, next you’ll be telling me the state has a plan to stop us using cash….

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9821855/Rishi-Sunak-plans-replace-cash-official-digital-currency.html

Matt Dalby
Matt Dalby
5 years ago

The WHO is partly to blame for the test and trace fiasco (and pretty much everything else that is wrong about most countries response to covid) as they said last year that the way out of the pandemic was to test, test, test.

Rowan
Rowan
5 years ago
Reply to  Matt Dalby

The WHO is a bunch of con artists given generous backing by “let’s vaccinate the world” Bill Gates. Sweden did its own thing, so the Pig Dictator and his bunch of crooks should net be let off the hook, no not for one moment.

monica coyle
monica coyle
5 years ago
Reply to  Rowan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yD3o6_QGJI
And the WHO director general Tedros Adhanom is one of the biggest con artists. He has a history of crimes against humanity so the vaccine roll out won’t be twanging his conscience

Smelly Melly
Smelly Melly
5 years ago

I’m probably confusing things but isn’t the T and T app world beating, so the fat pig dictator says.

Annie
Annie
5 years ago
Reply to  Smelly Melly

Well, it beats up supply chains, families, schools, hospitality, normal life generally…

JYC
JYC
5 years ago

A conversation that might have been overheard:

Sage member 1: Does anyone have any bright ideas for what we can do next to keep them locked up?
Sage member 2: I’ve got one, but I’m not sure they’d fall for it. We could tell them they’re free to go back to work and to seeing each other in pubs and the like, but then tell them that they need to go into isolation if we notify them that they’ve been in the same city as someone who’s had a positive test. That way, we can tell them they’re free, but actually we can still lock them up.
Sage member 1: It’s a long shot, but they’ve fallen for everything else like masks, distancing, experimental vaccines. Let’s give it a shot!

PoshPanic
PoshPanic
5 years ago
Reply to  JYC

Sage member 3: What about we introduce New Covid?

Draper233
Draper233
5 years ago

Tegnell is a fucking hero.

I have no idea how Nobel prizes work or whether he qualifies for any of the categories, but in a sane world he would be awarded one or something equivalent.

Witless, Unbalanced, Pantsdown et al would be awarded toilet brushes on a base.

Susan
Susan
5 years ago
Reply to  Draper233

Everybody should Fart in Their General Direction.

JohnK
JohnK
5 years ago
Reply to  Draper233

Absolutely right. Anders Tegnell was one of the few sane people I heard anything from last year. As it happens, Sweden has turned out to be one of the only reasonable places around here; quite a few more in America, though.

Monro
Monro
5 years ago

“It was as if the world had gone mad….”

Anders Tegnell

Legend

Silke David
Silke David
5 years ago
Reply to  Monro

Tegnell is pro vaccine.
It was not only his decision, the Swedish constitution did not allow for the rest of the world restrictions, which has now been amended in a way.

RW
RW
5 years ago
Reply to  Silke David

Neither did the so-called German constitution. Initiallly, the federal and the state governments just ignored it. Some months later, they made the so-called parliament “suspend” it for an indefinite amount of time. The present situation in Germany is such that there are still many Corona restrictions, especially, a universal mask mandate. But no Corona anymore (13.2 “cases” per 100.000 people). New restrictions are brought in for the unvaccinated as letting them continue in their filthy ways is just too risky now that there’s no “disease” anyhwere in sight.

If the leaders of a country turn into traitors to its people, constitutions don’t matter the least.

Tegnell deserves praise remaining openly sane in a world of conveniently feigned insanity and saving the Swedes from what has happened almost everywhere else in the so-called west.

TheyLiveAndWeLockdown
TheyLiveAndWeLockdown
5 years ago
Reply to  RW

The constitution is just a piece of paper if the citizens are not armed enough to fight the state for the return of their rights.

RickH
RickH
5 years ago

If the citizens were armed, the majority would be marching you to the internment camps.

Nearhorburian
Nearhorburian
5 years ago
Reply to  RickH

That’s why red states are so much more in favour of medical tyranny than are blue states.

If the British people hadn’t been steadily disarmed since WW1 I can’t see how we could possibly be more in favour of this evil.

RW
RW
5 years ago

Disarming the population is a fairly recent craze, ie “latter half of the 20th century”. Usually, even an armed population doesn’t stand much of a chance against a state. Successful revolutions/ insurrections are rare.

Nearhorburian
Nearhorburian
5 years ago
Reply to  RW

So why are states so determined to disarm their law-abiding populations?

RW
RW
5 years ago
Reply to  Nearhorburian

I have no idea. A best guess would be that this parallells driving speed limits: The society of always well-meaning nannys is afraid of something for no particular reason. Hence, it must be outlawed.

But this is really immaterial. Speculations about hidden motivations might be fun (I don’t think so) but they’re always useless and just distract from the issue at hand.

Hugh
Hugh
5 years ago
Reply to  RW

suspend? oh like in 1933. Seems it easily could happen – and indeed is happening – again

chris c
chris c
5 years ago
Reply to  Monro

Surprised he hasn’t been disappeared (yet)

BJs Brain is Missing
BJs Brain is Missing
5 years ago

Y2K on ‘effing steroids!

Hopeless
Hopeless
5 years ago

How can I claim asylum in Sweden? I lived in Norway and could perhaps resurrect my working knowledge of that Scandinavian language.

Perhaps some “self-identification” might work, but what?

Mark76
Mark76
5 years ago
Reply to  Hopeless

Identify as a Viking, maybe?

Hopeless
Hopeless
5 years ago
Reply to  Mark76

I’m on the horns of enough effing dilemmas already, without having costume concerns as well.

Evison1
Evison1
5 years ago
Reply to  Hopeless

That’s a serious point. I cannot tolerate much more compulsion to comply with politically motivate oppression, coerced vaccination, vaccine passports and so on.

patb
patb
5 years ago

Ferguson, Whitty and Vallance out, Tegnell in. How life would have been different.

miketa1957
miketa1957
5 years ago
Reply to  patb

And De Santis.

JohnK
JohnK
5 years ago
Reply to  patb

And BoJo would have morphed into something else. The best you can say is that he’s ‘flexible’. The real problem is granting too much influence to narrow minded ‘specialists’ in any field.

J Pearce
J Pearce
5 years ago

In reply to the title, because nearly every bit of our cuntry’s response to this has been flawed, flaky and now you can catch this exceptional virus through a fart!
https://m.tiktok.com/v/6978214740476710150.html

Eddie
Eddie
5 years ago
Reply to  J Pearce

I always had a hunch it was the farts

artfelix
artfelix
5 years ago
Reply to  J Pearce

So is a Dutch Oven now in contravention of the Geneva Protocol on germ warfare?

Asking for a friend.

J Pearce
J Pearce
5 years ago
Reply to  artfelix

No it’s ok if you wear a mask 😷

Nessimmersion
Nessimmersion
5 years ago
Reply to  J Pearce

But but, the covidians say you can’t smell farts through a cloth mask! therefore mask work or something.
Facts aren’t allowed in the room when a Covidian is in flow.

SueJM
SueJM
5 years ago
Reply to  J Pearce

Or a Dutch cap!

Jaguarpig
Jaguarpig
5 years ago

Dildo should be hung

artfelix
artfelix
5 years ago
Reply to  Jaguarpig

I don’t agree. I think he should be hanged. Unless you mean hung by his balls from a lamppost, in which case I’m with you.

artfelix
artfelix
5 years ago
Reply to  artfelix

Oh that Dildo. No balls then. There’s so many dildos involved I wasn’t sure which one you meant for a minute.

Epi
Epi
5 years ago
Reply to  artfelix

Yes my Mother always said meat is hung, people are hanged.

chris c
chris c
5 years ago
Reply to  Epi

Apocryhpal sign outside butcher’s

EVERYTHING IN THIS SHOP IS WELL HUNG

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