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– The Stockholm setting became a guiding star for the entire country, and probably would have been better adapted to local conditions from the start, says Hans Boman, infection control physician from Västernorrland.
When the Public Health Agency In March it is stated that the new coronavirus has begun to spread in society, Stockholm is the most affected in Sweden. Resources in the region for obtaining samples and tracking infections are very limited.
The region is shifting from sampling travelers from designated corona risk areas, to sampling primarily from patients who must be admitted to the hospital. At the same time, all the sick are urged to stay home.
March 13 is a strategy that the Swedish Public Health Agency recommends for all of Sweden.
With that According to the new sampling strategy, no longer should an attempt be made to identify every drop in the crown, and in many places more intensive infection monitoring will cease. But today, several infection control doctors criticize how the change in strategy was carried out.
– Yes, because it is very clear when we said that we do not have that situation with us. But because Stockholm is so big and had so many problems, that’s what they looked for nationally, says Signar Mäkitalo, then an infection control doctor in Gävleborg.
At the time of strategy change More than half of the country’s regions had fewer than a dozen confirmed cases.
Several infection control doctors Ekot spoke with believe that it would have been possible to continue with more intensive infection monitoring for at least a little longer, and also to test certain groups that did not need to be admitted – for example, more foreign travelers. And that it would have been good to slow down the rate of spread at the beginning of the pandemic.
But hadn’t you been able to make that kind of decision yourself as an infection control doctor?
– I think it is a very interesting question that we should take and talk about. How much can we do ourselves? And is there someone who dares to take the initiative and do something or are you waiting for someone national? Because what we’ve worked with in recent years is to achieve greater consensus, and finding that balance isn’t that easy, says Lisa Labbé Sandelin, an infection control physician at Kalmar.
Karin Tegmark Wisell, The head of department at the Swedish Public Health Agency does not think the Stockholm situation has received too much attention, but says the strategy was designed according to what would be best for all of Sweden.
She doesn’t understand the criticism from infection control doctors, but says regions that had the most resources to test and track infections have always been able to do so.
– Especially when we write in our documents that it is always the case that the regional infection control doctor has the opportunity to make a different assessment based on the regional situation, says Karin Tegmark Wisell.
At the same time, several say infection control doctors who feel that they would have gone against the Swedish Public Health Agency if they had not followed the strategy, and think it is a difficult decision to make as an individual infection control doctor.
So in hindsight, can you see that you could have done something different to be even clearer or provide even more support for this kind of local adaptation?
– I can’t see it right now. Then there is another question when you sit down with the result later. So more dialogue with infection control doctors: If they had contacted us and raised that this was a problem, we would have handled it in a different way, says Karin Tegmark Wisell, Public Health Agency.
