Architect of Sweden’s light touch on the COVID effort goes to the WHO
Stockholm: The man who became the face of Sweden’s no-lockdown pandemic policy, Anders Tegnell, resigns as chief epidemiologist to take on a role at the World Health Organization.
Tegnell, whose almost daily news conferences had Swedes glued to their screens during large parts of the pandemic, will be a senior expert on a WHO group tasked with coordinating covid activities for WHO, UNICEF and the public-private vaccine organization Gavi, the Swedish the public The health authority said.
Tegnell turned out to be a polarizing figure at the agency. He was forced to wear police protection after he and his family received death threats, but his face has also appeared on t-shirts with the slogan “In Tegnell we trust”. Some even got Tegnell tattoos.
“I have been working with vaccines for 30 years and at the same time have always been passionate about international issues,” Tegnell said in a statement. “It is still very important that the vaccines reach the countries that have not had the financial means to buy their own vaccines.”
More than 17,000 people have died in Sweden from or with covid-19, many times more per capita than in the Nordic neighboring countries but also fewer than in many other European countries that have chosen shutdowns.
When large parts of the world struggled to freeze when the coronavirus spread like wildfire during the northern winter and spring of 2020, Sweden stood out by choosing mild and voluntary measures. It kept schools open while most restaurants, bars and other businesses never closed. Masks were never recommended.
Tegnell, 65, argued that shutdowns were unsustainable and that voluntary action could achieve the same result without damaging trust between authorities and the public. He always insisted that his agency had never followed a herd immunity strategy, but he repeatedly suggested that his counterparts in Norway, Finland and Denmark would face a tougher task during the winter due to lower immunity levels in their populations.
But as deaths soon surpassed those in other Scandinavian countries, his critics argued that the lack of more urgent action actually eroded public confidence, while increasing levels of human suffering.