The King of Sweden said in a new speech that the country’s strategy to curb the spread of COVID-19 has “failed” as the death toll in the Scandinavian country continues to rise.
Carl XVI Gustaf told residents of the country in his annual Christmas speech that Sweden has suffered “enormously” amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and it is “traumatic” that many loved ones of the nearly 8,000 people who have died from COVID-19 could not say goodbye personally.
“I think we have failed. We have a large number of people who have died and that is terrible. It’s something we all have to suffer with, ”the king said in comments published on Thursday that will be broadcast in full on Monday, the Financial Times has translated.
Sweden has resisted the implementation of a national blockade during the coronavirus pandemic, unlike many of its European countries.
However, according to reports, Swedish officials are considering implementing closures as some of the country’s intensive care units reach capacity, the New York Times reported this week.
Sweden has reported approximately 1,700 deaths from COVID-19 in the last month, compared to approximately 100 deaths each in Finland and Norway. Both countries have about half the population of Sweden.
The king, when asked if he was afraid of becoming infected with coronavirus, said that “more has been noticed lately. It has crept closer and closer. That’s not what you want, ”according to the Financial Times.
Sweden’s leading infectious disease expert said late last month that the country had seen no evidence that herd immunity was holding back the spread of COVID-19 in the country. Herd immunity is the point at which a disease ceases to spread widely through a population because there are enough individuals immune to it, either by recovering from an infection or by vaccines.