Except that the article gives evidence to the contrary.

There is nothing very 'scientifically more accurate' about Sweden's approach to COVID.

This is the 'Swedish Model' narrative which borders on propaganda, promulgating an exceptional view of the Swedish government.

More often than not, bureaucrats take decisions they think are right, but which can just as easily be base on the arrogance or myopic view of the local institution.

Every response in this COVID article illustrates that:

- 'Closing borders' has been imminently successful in slowing the spread of Covid in almost every case - either giving more time for officials to prepare, aggressively suppressing it (Korea), or - locking out the disease almost completely (Taiwan).

- The 'trust-based' Swedish approach is irrational - because the issue is not 'trust'. The issue is literally physical distance. If Swedes are 'going to restaurants and school' and 'restaurants are a serious vector' - then COVID will spread, it's that simple.

- "What evidence was this approach based on?
It is difficult to talk about the scientific basis of a strategy with these types of disease, because we do not know much about it and we are learning as we are doing, day by day. Closedown, lockdown, closing borders — nothing has a historical scientific basis, in my view. "

This is not true! We have historical data from pandemics, particularly from America which demonstrate cities that went on lockdown were able to recover more quickly from the Spanish flue. Moreover - the issue is risk. The more 'unknowns' there are, the more likely we err on the side of caution, not risk.

- "We do not need to close down everything completely because it would be counterproductive" we're 100% certain that lock-downs prevent spread - the issue then becomes one of value vs. cost, but it's not fair to them to indicate it's 'counter-productive'.

Even his testimony about 'asymptomatic spread' is strongly challenged by some evidence. Yes, we don't know for sure, but to assume the negative, given the consequences, does not fit this 'we use science not common sense' pragmatism. It's just plain risky.

"I recently had reason to investigate to what extent maternal/neonatal care followed the best of our scientific knowledge and it was extremely close. If you think that's a given, think again. Many countries base their maternal/neonatal care on common sense and old wives' tales instead."

This is only anecdotal and it's not substantiated.

...

The media perspective is mind-blowing: everyone seems to give 'Noble Sweden' the benefit of the doubt with respect to their measures, talking about the supposed effectiveness of it ... but if a Republican Governor were to suggest literally the same measures, they'd be mocked mercilessly on CNN.

This is happening literally, today on CNN: governors/mayors wishing to make limited openings of their states, remaining still more closed than Sweden, and wherein they have fewer cases than Sweden, are getting the harsh treatment.

I do think they all need to get hard questions from the press, but let's not pretend there's anything more magical going on here with respect to the policy or behaviuor, and treat these groups more 'in kind'.