Coronavirus: Sweden hopes voluntary lockdowns will tackle hotspots

The move marks a shift from its ‘light-touch’ approach but there is no sign that Swedes will be urged to wear masks.

People walk through a street in Stockholm amid the coronavirus pandemic. Picture: AFP

Stockholm and other areas of Sweden are facing voluntary local lockdowns as the authorities draw up “strong recommendations” against using public transport or going to bars, restaurants and non-essential shops.

Swedes in coronavirus hotspots such as Uppsala, Orebro and Jamtland could also be advised to avoid travelling outside their region, physical contact with anyone from other households and visits to people in risk groups, including the elderly.

While compliance with the rules will be voluntary and there are no plans to punish violations with fines or prison sentences, they are likely to have a noticeable impact on daily life in the affected areas.

The guidance marks a shift in strategy from a country that had previously been regarded as a standard-bearer for a more “light-touch” approach to the pandemic.

Since the start of September the number of new cases detected each day has risen from an average of 160 to nearly 700.

In Jamtland, a thinly populated region of central Sweden, there were 95 new diagnoses for every 100,000 inhabitants last week.

The country’s national infection rate, at 45.9 per 100,000 people over the past seven days for which figures have been made public, remains low by European standards and roughly comparable to Germany’s.

Yet officials have been alarmed by the scale of the outbreaks in some districts and the emergence of what appears to be a novel, possibly more contagious form of the virus across the border in Norway. Several hundred people have been quarantined in the Norwegian city of Trondheim after 35 people became infected with a previously unknown mutation of the coronavirus.

Anders Tegnell, Sweden’s state epidemiologist, had previously suggested that the national guidelines could be relaxed in time for Christmas but is now touring the country to advise local authorities on whether they need to introduce more stringent measures.

He has called on Swedes to refrain from socialising after work. He is also worried that the infection rate in nursing homes has doubled over the past week.

“In the first instance we always begin by trying to help people to better understand the restrictions we already have in place,” Dr Tegnell, 64, told SVT, the public broadcaster. “If they don’t seem to have an effect … then of course we need to consider other ways to constrain these opportunities for transmission.”

The district around Uppsala, a university city about 35 miles north of Stockholm, may be the first to adopt the new measures after outbreaks linked to students, coffee shops and private parties.

Last week it had 75 new infections for every 100,000 residents, the third highest in the country.

The plan remains unclear but a list of possible warnings published last week by Sweden’s Public Health Agency includes recommendations to avoid all shops except pharmacies and supermarkets. There is, however, no sign that Swedes will be urged to wear masks.

During the first wave of the pandemic Sweden was the only sizeable European state other than Belarus that did not order some form of mandatory lockdown, reasoning that in the long term it would be more sustainable to encourage the public to follow official advice.

The country has recorded 5918 coronavirus deaths.

In per capita terms the toll has been ten times higher than in Finland but lower than those in Belgium, the UK, Italy and Spain.

Antigen tests suggest Stockholm and London have had similar rates of infection, with about a fifth of each city’s population exposed to the disease.

The Times