Sweden did basically that for the longest time, only it was people under 70 who where able to live their lives quite like usual. I mean of course not all the way as usual, my uni was distanced, people were encouraged to work remotely, not go to malls, large gatherings were banned and so on.

But I went swimming, started climbing, met up with friends all while being pretty firmly within the recommendations. And my uni had a partially in person introduction for new students.

Now restrictions are harder, my climbing gym has closed, so has the pool and no one should gather in a group larger than 8 legally (and not really meet anyone outside of their household). But I can go outside as much as I want, and I'm meeting up with a friend who lives in the same building as me. And visiting my parents occasionally.

I have mixed feelings about it. I am very thankful i got to swim and climb and all of those things, and I think I'd have suffered mentally from the lack of it. In a way it feels easier to not have it now since I'm kind of used to the pandemic in a way. Frog in boiling water style.

At the same time over 10 000 people have died. But would me staying at home have helped that? Many of those deaths were in nursing homes due to structural problems like under-staffing and a too high rotation of staff. But if the level of covid-19 in the general population was lower maybe that staff wouldn't have gotten sick?

But countries with hard lockdowns also seem to be suffering. It doesn't seem to have solved the corona problem there, and it probably wouldn't have here either. Would it have helped? Would it have helped enough to be worth it?