Look at Sweden. Social distancing is the official strategy but we can still go to restaurants and schools are open. It's not black or white and the US lockdown is definitely not minimal compared to Sweden.
Yeah... about that.
From a western news outlet point of view, it seems like Sweden is doing it wrong.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8235979/UKs-coronav...
https://www.welt.de/print/die_welt/finanzen/article207268361...
As of the latest WHO status report they count 1'540 dead as per yesterday[2].
Given, that they country only 14385 confirmed cases this indicates that there is a massive lack in testing.
Looking at experiences from other countries the numbers are bound to explode in the next few days.
I understand, given the current yearning for wishful thinking that people point to Sweden as a role model for managing the crisis.
The grim reality, however, looks very different and Sweden is on the best way to one of the greatest corona catastrophies in Europe.
So much for Sweden having it under control.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/19/anger-in-swede...
[2]https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/situati...
Yes, we've only been testing people who require medical attention. No-one thinks we only have 15 000 cases. We probably have a hundreds of thousands of cases in Stockholm alone but the consensus in Sweden is that Stockholm will reach herd immunity in May.
Neighbouring countries are starting to ease up their restrictions so I think we will see an explosion of cases there compared to Sweden but let's talk again in a few days to see if it really exploded in Sweden like you claim it will.
Sweden has more than twice the number of confirmed cases Czech Republic has (~14700 vs ~6900). This is a hard thing to compare, this could be attributed to differences in testing, doesn't include asymptomatic cases and some suggest there's a bit of clever accounting going on so let's look at something else ...
Sweden currently has eight times the number of deaths the Czech Republic has (1580 vs 196). This is an absolutely incredible incredible difference! The Anglosphere has for a while had a really unhealthy obsession with the Nordic countries, Sweden in particular (I have my own theories on why). When it was apparent they were pursuing a more relaxed approach to Covid 19 many in the media and the public seemed desperate to latch on to them as How it Should Be Done. However it seems that in this case they should really have looked East for inspiration, rather than North.
[0] = https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=population+of+sweden+v... ... and in fact given how large it is and how distant it is from other early hotspots, the Sweden/Czech comparison should be an unfair comparison in Sweden's favour.
Not sure why you say the media was praising Sweden's approach. I only saw international media completely bashing Sweden's strategy but that has changed the last week now when the death rate curve is declining in Sweden and we still have ICU capacity.
Update: here is an example of the sort of article I mean. At that moment everyone was running with this idea, not just the BBC: https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200328-how-to-self-is...
I don’t quite understand the first part of your comment - when to relax restrictions is a problem everyone will have and is not unique to Czech Republic. Granted, the huge success of the measures here might make the decision a little harder ... but the fact that we have prevented thousands of deaths is a GOOD thing and shouldn’t be taken as a negative.