Skeptics of America’s (mostly) national lockdown say Sweden’s lighter-touch approach is far superior. They argue it strikes a much better balance between public health and economic health. Unlike many other advanced economies, the government has not imposed a strict quarantine on its population. Most workplaces, restaurants, and bars have stayed open. Kids are still physically attending school. Only recently have authorities limited social gatherings to a maximum of 50 people, a revision down from 500 people previously. And further restrictions are being debated .

How’s that approach working so far? Well, Sweden certainly hasn’t been spared sickness and death from COVID-19. As I write this, Sweden has reported 7,693 total cases and 591 deaths. Its fatality rate per capita is higher than in the United States or any other Scandinavian country, notes The Washington Post . And while Sweden’s total cases per million residents (762) are fewer than Nordic neighbors Norway (1089) and Denmark (875), they are more than Finland (417). Sweden has also conducted fewer tests per million than those other nations.

We’ll see what it all looks like when curves have been flattened. But a quick note on comparing Sweden to Switzerland, which is on a tight lockdown and so far has more than three times as many cases per million and nearly twice as many deaths. It should be noted that Switzerland’s population density is pretty much the same as neighbor Italy’s, also a high outbreak country, and 10 times as high as Sweden’s. Moreover, Sweden has one of the highest shares of one-person households in the world (24 percent), far higher than Norway (19 percent), Denmark (17 percent), Finland (15 percent), and Switzerland (14 percent). Perhaps this helps prevent the virus from spreading. There are a lot of factors to untangle.

The economic impact of the Swedish strategy is also unclear. The government certainly thinks it’s going to be pretty bad. According to the National Institute of Economic Research, an agency that reports to the Finance Ministry, its baseline scenario has Swedish real GDP growth declining by 3.4 percent this year, worse than its 2.9 percent forecast for the United States. It also sees a 6 percent contraction in the second quarter, comparable to the annualized US forecasts by Wall Street of a 25 percent to 30 percent contraction here from April through June. From the NIER: “Concern about infection and official advice on limiting social contact are putting a major damper on household demand, and delivery problems are disrupting production in parts of the business sector. … However, there is extreme uncertainty about future developments.” It doesn’t seem the light-touch approach provides immunity from severe economic hardship.

Finally, I always caution against mindlessly extrapolating what works in Scandinavia to also be successful in the US. You can’t just cut-and-paste policy from a region with a very different cultural and historical background. I would double down on that advice during an evolving pandemic and economic shock.

This article by James Pethokoukis first appeared in AEIdeas on April 4, 2020.

Image: Reuters.