Public health ministry launches major study to discover if anecdotal evidence of decline in lovemaking is true – and if so, explain it

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

The Swedish government is launching a major study of the sex lives of its citizens after reports that lovemaking is on the wane.

It has been 20 years since the last in-depth study of the sex habits of the Scandinavian country, so the public health minister, Gabriel Wikström, says it is high time for another survey.



One of the goals of the study, due to be completed in 2019, is to find out whether there’s any truth to Swedish media reports that Swedes are having less sex than they used to.

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“It’s important to investigate whether that is the case and, if so, what the reason is,” Wikström wrote in an opinion piece for the Dagens Nyheter newspaper.

If stress and other health issues are affecting Swedes’ sex lives, he said, “that is also a political problem”.

Morgan Eklund, an official in Wikström’s office, said the minister was referring primarily to a 2013 survey of 3,000 people by the Aftonbladet tabloid, which found that people are having sex less often in the country, which has a reputation for being sexually liberated.

Eklund said the survey was not scientific enough to be used as the basis of government policies “but it points in a direction that can be interesting to follow up”.

In a separate article on the government’s website, Wikström said the Social Democratic-led government needs better information about people’s sex habits to guide policies on sexual and reproductive health.

“Sex is an area that strongly influences people’s health, so we can’t just talk about things like, for example, venereal disease, but also things that are positive and lust-filled about sex,” Wikström said.

The study will be carried out by the Public Health Agency of Sweden.