The Coronavirus has caused both a global health crisis as well as an economic crisis. Governments across the world have taken strict measures to curtail infection rates. However, approximately 25% of economic activity is currently shut down in most countries, as described in this paper by CE.
A number of countries have now successfully managed to flatten the curve of new infections, hospitalisations, and, ultimately, the number of people dying each day.
This has triggered a debate in all countries on how to exit from these lockdowns, which have especially affected the service industries (having borne the brunt of the restrictions).
We believe we can learn some lessons by looking at the approaches adopted in the three Scandinavian countries. In Denmark and Norway, the prompt containment measures introduced in response to COVID-19 have been similar. In contrast, the measures put in place in Sweden are different to its Scandinavian neighbours, with fewer and later restrictions overall. This is both reflected in health as well as economic data.
From this perspective, we will analyse the following in this paper:
