Government and Institutions

Sweden’s approach to Covid-19 may have been vindicated


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In the Media

Tom Clougherty writes for The Times

Economic Affairs article featured in The Spectator

The Covid-19 lesson from Sweden: Don’t lock down, an article by Lund University’s Professor Lars Jonung and Fredrik N G Andersson published in Economic Affairs, has been featured in The Spectator.

The article said:

“The paper, published by the Institute for Economic Affairs, seeks correlations between the severity of lockdown restrictions in 25 European OECD members and outcomes in terms of excess deaths, economic growth and public deficits. It seems to provide a fairly clear answer: lockdowns were associated with higher overall levels of excess deaths, poorer economic performance and higher public debt.

“Overall, the study establishes a fairly weak positive correlation between severity of lockdown and excess deaths. It establishes stronger negative correlations between severity of lockdown and economic growth, and between lockdown severity and the fiscal cost of the pandemic (as measured by the size of the budget deficit in 2020 and 2021 divided by GDP in 2019).”

Read the full article here.

You can also read a copy of The Covid-19 lesson from Sweden: Don’t lock down here.

Lars Jonung was a co-author of Did lockdowns work? The verdict on Covid restrictions, a book published by the IEA arguing that the costs of lockdown policies far exceeded their benefits.



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