Sweden says coronavirus likely in country in November as death toll approaches 3,000
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Sweden’s state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell says he would not be surprised if Sweden – like France – had isolated cases of coronavirus as far back as November last year.
“I think you could find individual cases among travellers to Wuhan who were there back in November and December last year,” he told Sweden’s TT news agency, when asked about the Paris case. “That doesn’t sound strange at all, but more completely to be expected.”
Yves Cohen, head of intensive care at the Avicenne hospital in Paris, told BFM TV on Sunday that his staff had retested samples taken from patients admitted for pneumonia in December, and that one from December 27 had tested positive for coronavirus – even though the 53-year-old patient had not travelled to China.
Previously, Europe’s first case of Covid-19 was confirmed on January 24, almost a month later.
According to Sweden’s defence forces, none of the 100 Swedish soldiers who were in Wuhan in October last year to take part in the 2019 Military World Games had tested positive for coronavirus.
Tegnell in his latest press conference on Wednesday said the country, which has taken a softer approach to curbing the spread of the coronavirus, was nearing 3,000 deaths from Covid-19.
The country’s Public Health Agency reported that a total of 23,918 cases had been confirmed and 2,941 deaths had been recorded, an increase of 87 deaths from the day before.
“We are starting to near 3,000 deceased, a horrifyingly large number,” state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell told the press conference.
The Swedish approach has received criticism both domestically and internationally as its death toll has leapt much higher than its Nordic neighbours, which have all instituted more restrictive containment measures.
Sweden’s virus death rate of 291 per million inhabitants is far higher than Norway’s death rate of 40 per million, Denmark’s rate of 87, or Finland’s rate of 45.
