Our researchers comments the corona pandemic from their field of expertise. All the articles, videos and interviews are collected here.
Is Sweden's soft lockdown working?
Despite relatively high number of covid 19 related deaths in Sweden compared to other countries, the effects on health metrics on a population level is limited, says Martin Kolk, demographer, to the American news channel Newsy, in a segment on the Swedish corona strategy. "The effect on population level health metrics is quite limited. In order to really evaluate what different countries are doing and to judge both the epidemiological, societal and economic consequences, we really have to wait at least one year."
The rise of the epidemiologists
An article in the french journal L'Obs (Le nouvel observateur) deals with the phenomenon of the glorification of the cheif epidemiologists in many countries. What does this say about us and our fear? Gustaf Arrhenius, director of the Institute for Futures Studies is interviewed: "The relationship of trust between the people and Anders Tegnell (the Swedish state epidemiologist) is like the one between a sick and his doctor". For all of you who know french, read the pdf version of the print issue here > Des scientifiques superstars
Trust in Institutions and Attitudes Towards the Future
"Suppose that reducing your standard of living allowed people in the future to lead better lives. Would you be willing to do it? What we found surprised us. In all four countries, people who thought living standards would increase were more willing to sacrifice their own standard of living for the sake of people who haven't been born yet. So a lot of us, it seems, are willing to make a kind of voluntary, charitable contribution... to people who we think will be richer than us?" Malcolm Fairbrother writes about the working paper “How Much Do We Value Future Generations? Climate Change, Debt, and Attitudes towards Policies for Improving Future Lives”.
The Swedish Exception?
Erik Angner, economist and philosopher, and Gustaf Arrhenius, professor in moral and political philosophy and director of IFFS explain the context of Sweden's response to the Covid-19 pandemic, seen as straying well away from the mainstream.
Where there is trust, there is testing
In the US, levels of Covid-19 testing have varied greatly between states. But there seems to be a pattern. According to a new study by Malcolm Fairbrother, researcher at Institute for Futures Studies, together with colleagues, states with high levels of social trust and social capital performs more Covid-19 tests.
Three mistakes in the moral reasoning about the covid-19 pandemic
Orri Stefánsson, philosopher at the Institute for Futures Studies and decision theorist, dissects the moral reasoning about the Covid-19 pandemic.
The coronavirus, mortality and life expectancy
Demographer Martin Kolk calculates how the average life expectancy can be affected
An epidemiologist answers viewers questions on the pandemic
Video from webinar on March 18.
