Denmark has all ended its Corona rules – despite high numbers. In the eyes of international corona experts, the opening is a big mistake. But the state health authority defends itself against this representation – and answers directly on Twitter.
Denmark’s Freedom Day 2.0 – i.e. the lifting of all corona restrictions – caused a lot of international attention. Not least because the Scandinavian country opened up despite the high number of infections. Since all measures were lifted, the numbers in the country have actually not fallen – in some cases they have even risen.
numbers and graphics of the state health authority Statens Serum Institut (SSI) show that the number of daily new infections is leveling off at a high level. The number of hospitalizations has increased in recent weeks, as have deaths related to Corona. However, the number of intensive care patients remains at a low level: There are currently 31 people in Denmark with Corona in intensive care units. For comparison: In Hamburg – which has around three times fewer inhabitants than Denmark – this figure is given as 68.
Serious allegations of opening in Denmark
Nevertheless: International corona experts criticize the Danish way. On Twitter, they explain with graphics why Denmark’s openings are wrong. One of them is the epidemiologist Eric Feigl-Ding, who was long at Harvard University. The Danish government has “completely lost its damn mind,” Feigl-Ding wrote on Twitter. He shows a graphic from the data portal “Our World in Data“. “That’s exponentially increasing DEATHS, not infections!!! That’s what happens when a country’s leaders gaslight its own citizens.” “Gaslighting” is when someone deliberately tries to unsettle another human being — until a breakdown occurs.
There is an “endemic deception”. “Say what you will about the ICUs, but the hospital admissions and deaths don’t lie.” Feigl-Ding stated that many died “with” and not “because of” Covid-19. “But Denmark has really taken a risky stance that Covid is not a serious disease.” One would ignore death and hospitalization numbers.
The SSI responded directly to Feigl-Ding on his Twitter thread: “We want to reiterate that the numbers you’re sharing with your followers show C-19 deaths. Not C-19 related deaths.” Feigl-Ding replied: “Whoever is holding your account is doing the citizens of your country and the world a great disservice. The ‘with vs because of’ is a familiar old Covid denial.”
Health authority responds on Twitter
Eric Topol, a cardiologist from the USA, also published on Twitter Graphics from “Our World in Data” with the comment that things are “not looking good” in Denmark. The American economist, Nobel Prize winner and columnist Paul Krugman also wrote down Twitter: “So are we really sure we want to rush to lift all Covid restrictions?”
The SSI does not want to let the criticism sit on it. For a few days now, the authority has been answering entries on the Danish corona numbers on Twitter – including among experts. On the SSI Twitter account you can see where and how answers are given, often in English. The experts at the SSI are often busy explaining the difference between hospitalized or deceased “because of” and “with” Corona, like the Danish television station TV2 reported.
SSI press chief Flemming Platz told TV2 he felt it was necessary to put the numbers in perspective. Many of the Twitter posts would not have taken into account the increase in the number of people hospitalized or dying with, and not because of, the coronavirus in recent weeks. “But you can’t read that abroad and it’s misunderstood. Some do it on purpose, some do it because they don’t understand Danish.”
SSI refutes claims online
The information campaign even goes so far that the health authorities own website has started, which provides information in English about the “typical misinformation regarding Danish Covid numbers”. Various hypotheses and questions are discussed here.
The SSI writes that this is not correct when it comes to the claim that a large number of people are hospitalized in Denmark because of a corona infection. “By week 5, 2022, 2,391 Covid-19 positive people had been hospitalized compared to 296,630 PCR-confirmed Covid-19 cases. The proportion of hospitalizations of Covid-19 positive people has decreased since September 2021. The Proportion of Covid-19 positive people hospitalized for Covid-19 has decreased compared to people hospitalized with Covid-19 since July 2021. Proportion of people hospitalized for Covid-19 people by week 5 is now about 60% of the Covid-19 positive people in hospital.”
The SSI clarifies here: “Hospitalized for Covid-19 means a person is hospitalized for Covid-19. Hospitalized for Covid-19 means a person is hospitalized and has a positive PCR test. This means not that the person is in the hospital for Covid-19.” An example: someone who is hospitalized with a broken leg and also has a positive corona test is With Covid-19 hospitalized.
Psychiatric clinics fill up with Covid patients? Wrong, says SSI
Henrik Ullum, head of the SSI, said that too star in a conversation on the occasion of the end of the corona restrictions on February 1: “We can see in our statistics that there are more and more cases in which the corona infection is accidental. For example, according to our statistics, 20 percent of our patients are in our psychiatric wards, who are also ill with Covid.”
However, incorrect information seems to be circulating there as well. This is how the SSI lists the claim that psychiatric wards would fill up with Covid patients as the number of intensive care beds was reduced. The agency’s response to this: “The increasing number of Covid-19 positive people in psychiatric wards reflects the fact that by week 4 of 2022 an increasing number of people in Denmark have been infected with the omicron variant, which in comparison to earlier variants leads to a milder disease.”
In addition, a very high proportion of the Danish population has been vaccinated against the corona virus. “For the same reasons, psychiatric patients – like the rest of the Danish population – are currently experiencing higher rates of Covid-19. But Covid-19 positive psychiatric patients only remain in psychiatric wards if they have no symptoms of Covid-19, who need to be treated with hospitalization in somatic hospital wards, let alone intensive care units.”
Feigl thing with harsh criticism of the SSI
The conclusion: “The psychiatric wards see an increasing number of Covid 19 patients due to the general increase in Covid 19 infected people in Denmark, but none of these patients have to be treated in hospital in somatic wards.”
Michael Bang Petersen, professor and leader of the Hope Project at Aarhus University, which measures Danish attitudes and behavior during the Corona epidemic, also explained the Danish figures. He believes that more nuances are needed in the debate, but also sees this as an indication that there is a polarized debate about the corona virus in the USA. “The vast majority of those involved in the debate don’t care about Denmark. It’s about the American debate where one wing has a motivation to use Denmark to say, ‘Look how wrong it is going ‘when it opens’, TV2 quotes Michael Bang Petersen as saying.
Michael Bang Petersen thinks it is particularly important to take into account that despite high infection rates, fewer intensive care patients are being admitted than before and that an increasing proportion are being hospitalized with, and not because of, the coronavirus.
But Eric Feigl-Ding sticks to his opinion. In a comment to TV2, he wrote: “SSI negligently supplies ammunition to rights neglecting and denying Covid.”
How reliable is the data?
However, the whole debate also discusses how reliable the data and graphics from “Our World in Data” are, which the experts mentioned have spread on Twitter. After all, the data portal is based at the University of Oxford.
The Danish political scientist Michael Bang Petersen wrote about it Twitter, one must be “extremely careful” when sharing screenshots of “Our World in Data”. He also points to the difference between “because of” and “with” Corona in hospitalizations and deaths.
Edouard Mathieu, head of “Our World in Data”, also commented on the debate about the Danish corona numbers. On Twitter, he emphasized that the numbers used by the portal refer to official data. Commenting on the ‘because of-or-with’ distinction, he commented: “The Danish national health authorities have recently reported that the proportion of patients ‘with’ COVID has increased significantly, both in terms of hospitalizations and deaths. The problem is that they Only make the distinction clear in hard-to-find articles and PDF reports.”
According to its information, the official corona dashboard of the SSI does not differentiate between these categories. This is indeed the case. “And that’s how this data – because it’s the official data – gets into the Johns Hopkins database and thus into our graphics.” Many people would look at the dashboard – and not at the reports from the health authority, where the numbers are broken down in more detail.
Corona dashboard does not differentiate
Mathieu stressed that he does not distinguish between a “right” and “wrong” count, or that Denmark scores “good” or “bad”. “I say it’s easy to understand that a lot of people get confused when authorities report official data in one place but say elsewhere that that data isn’t good.”
Conclusion: It is correct that the number of infections, hospitalizations and deaths in Denmark are increasing or at a high level. They give that too Graphics of the SSI here. However, the authority emphasizes that a distinction must be made between “because of” and “with” Corona. They underline that the proportion of those who are admitted “because of” Corona has decreased. The situation in the intensive care units is much more relaxed. But since this distinction is not Dashboard of the SSI done, it is possible to misunderstand these numbers. Whether Denmark’s openings were right or wrong can probably only be said with certainty in the future.
Other sources: “Berlingske”, “Jyllands-Posten”