SWEDEN recorded its deadliest month in 30 years in April, according to new statistics released today – but the country still keeps cafes, bars, schools and restaurants open.
The pandemic has caused around 3,700 deaths in the country since the first reported fatality in March.
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Sweden has suffered a higher death rate during the coronavirus pandemic than its Scandinavian neighbours.
On April 1, Sweden reported 239 coronavirus-related deaths, but that number reached 2,586 by April 30.
The Statistics Office said the total death toll in April this year – also counting deaths not related to Covid-19 – was 10,458, Reuters reports.
This is the highest death toll the country reported in a single month since December 1993, when 11,057 people died.
Tomas Johansson, population statistician at Statistics Sweden, said: “We have to go back to December 1993 to find more dead during a single month.”
In total, 97,008 deaths were recorded in Sweden during the whole of 1993, which in turn was the deadliest year since 1918, when the Spanish flu pandemic ravaged the country.
Sweden has kept schools open for children under the age of 16, along with cafes, bars, restaurants and businesses, and urged people to respect social distancing guidelines.
About 90 per cent of the 3,700 people who have died from coronavirus in Sweden were over 70 and half were living in care homes, according to a study from Sweden’s National Board of Health and Welfare at the end of April.
Health minister Lena Hallengren told Swedish Television: “We failed to protect our elderly. That’s really serious, and a failure for society as a whole.”
On Monday, Sweden reported a total of 30,377 confirmed cased of the new coronavirus and 3,698 deaths.
Recent good spring weather has seen Swedes gathering in outdoor bars and restaurants while parks have been packed despite the Covid-19 pandemic.
Restaurants and bars are only allowed to provide table service, with tables spaced one to two metres apart.
Five Stockholm bars and restaurants were closed after they failed to meet social distancing guidelines.
Sweden’s government says its more relaxed approach is a better long-term strategy because people will accept the looser restrictions for longer.
But it is a move which has sparked a fierce debate in Sweden and among the wider scientific community with some medics warning “it will lead to catastrophe.”
Several European countries, including Spain and Italy, have eased their lockdown measures as the number of infections and deaths has been going down.
It comes after people across Europe headed to parks and the coast at the weekend to enjoy their new freedoms as the worst-hit continent begins to emerge from the tough restrictions.
Beaches were packed in Greece, and surfers flocked to newly reopened Lacanau in France which had been shut for two months.
Parks around Paris and Annecy were also heaving with sunbathers, while outdoor cafes were busy with customers in Germany.
In Italy today, more businesses including shops, bars and hairdressers opened their doors for the first time in two months.
However, travel between regions and into Italy is still banned until at least June 3.
Spain is set for a shopping bonanza as the annual sales are due to go ahead despite social distancing fears.
Even in Madrid and Barcelona – which have not yet fully entered Phase 1 of exiting lockdown – smaller shops will be allowed to welcome customers without an appointment.
And outside the two big cities, people will be allowed to gather outdoors in groups of ten.
Portugal, Greece, Denmark and Ireland are also easing their lockdown measures by degrees.
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