Denmark is beating COVID-19 and that is good news for the Rest of The World Allan Greenwood Follow Apr 5 · 3 min read

Summary

Denmark is beating COVID and they are doing it without restrictive lock-downs!

Denmark’s fight against COVID

Denmark acted early and aggressively in bringing in lock-downs and was the second country to implement lock-downs in Europe. In fact, they implemented the first stage of lock-downs the day before they recorded their first death.

However, when they acted there was community transmission occurring, and this can be seen in the progression of cases and deaths that has followed. At the time writing 4/4/2020 Denmark had recorded 161 deaths from Corona-virus and has over 4000 confirmed cases.

Over the first few days of April they have hit a milestone in that the number of patients hospitalized has decreasing (The number of New COVID-19 patients requiring hospitilisation are less than those leaving hospital)

Hospitalisations in Denmark

This means that they are getting the virus under control.

Details of Denmark’s Lock Downs

Denmark’s Lock-Down was introduced on the 13th March with the following characteristics

· Schools were closed, Daycare limited to only serve parents who had essential jobs or no alternative arrangements

· Public Servants in non-essential jobs were told to stay home. Private Companies encouraged to do the same thing

· Indoor institutions where closed (i.e. Libraries, swimming pools)

This lock-down was tightened further on the 18th of March by

· Gatherings of more than 10 were banned

· Shopping centers and stores with close contact such as hairdressers were closed

· Restaurants were restricted to takeaway only

This lock-down appears to include a lot of activities, but it is important to note what was not included in the lock down.

· No Recommendation for wearing of Masks

· No Forced closure of wider industry (i.e. Factories / Construction)

· Restrictions is only for groups greater than 10

· Outdoor parks remained open

These restrictions are nowhere near as draconian as other European restrictions and Google Mobility Data Demonstrates that Denmark implemented limited restrictions relative to else where

Google Mobility data is sourced from users who have opted into Google using their location data and measures how frequently phones are in the designated areas vs before COVID-19 occurred. What the diagram above shows is that all the countries sampled reduced their use of Transit Stations with Sweden reducing by around 40 percent and France / Italy and Spain by almost 90 percent.

What Else Did Denmark Do?

In addition to the lock downs Denmark’s quarantined anyone infected and all their close contacts for 2 weeks. This included daily contact with medical practitioners.

Conclusion

Potentially Denmark has got lucky and things may yet fall apart but if you are looking for good news then this is Great News! I can’t think of any of any other news over the last month which is as positive as these early results from Denmark.

It means that a pathway other than Complete society paralysis as implemented in Italy, Spain and China can be successful for western democracies.

Links

Mobility Data

https://www.google.com/covid19/mobility/

Hospitilisations

https://nyheder.tv2.dk/samfund/2020-04-04-antallet-af-indlagte-i-danmark-falder-for-tredje-dag-i-traek

Denmark Lock-down

https://nyheder.tv2.dk/samfund/2020-03-11-danmark-lukker-ned-her-er-regeringens-nye-tiltag

https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/politik/faa-overblikket-over-de-nye-corona-tiltag-se-hvad-du-ikke-maa-fra-i-dag-klokken-10