we are working tirelessly to keep you informed on over platforms we are all in this spirit together and will make it through. do you see everybody stays very safe stay safe for you to say. every day is very tragic with such a high death toll how can you say that your strategy is working well it sounds like you want to troll a sort of e.u. conflict zone is on summer break and when you look back on this season's most controversial interviews in mid june i spoke with sweden's foreign minister and linda about the country's unique trust based approach to tackling the coronavirus pandemic with a death toll much higher than its neighbors of the chief epidemiologist admitting mistakes we asked of sweden had made a deadly error the interview generated

a wave of reactions and political debate in sweden including from the leader of the opposition and the prime minister. i. i. i. foreign minister and linda welcome to conflict zone thank you very much you said recently that sweden's trust based strategy to combat the coronavirus was working your prime minister also continues to maintain the strategy was the right one but to date you have nearly 5000 confirmed coronavirus debts far higher per capita than your neighbors who impose stricter lock downs early on with such a high death toll how can you say that your strategy is working. well actually we had the same goals as most other governments that says to save life and the health and also to keep the system in the health service able to

cope with this very strong push on the limits and actually we manage to flatten the curve we have there for have. problems we getting sick people into the health care. actually or so we have managed to get our people to follow the recommendation and we also have legally binding measures like social distancing and also washing your hands don't travel and work from home all of those issues what we have not managed to do is to keep the virus out of the elderly care center in a specific region of stock or and the surrounding of stock or so i would say that it's a tragic for each death but it's not possible to compare it with any country some

countries who have had complete look downs has far more death tolls than we have so it's actually no use to do such comparisons and i want to talk about that impact on the of the elderly which has been so dramatic in your country but 1st i'd like to just pick up on something that you said because you said that you've managed to flatten the curve but we have a european center for disease control saying the initial wave of transition transmission excuse me has passed its peak in all countries in europe except sweden and poland what does this say about your strategy because you know how not to remarry and i would like the counter what you're saying there because that is not true and that was our state appear merely to said today that we have gone far. away from the peak we are going down but 2 weeks ago we started a massive testing for virus meaning that everybody every single person if you don't

even have the slightest symptom you can go and test yourself and of course that means that we will now have a much much much greater number of viruses and that's why so wrong just to look at that situation we don't have any except excess of death anymore we have far more places available when it comes to his intensive care so it's absolutely what you look at and to to listen to our sheaf opinion merely against the it is not the way that there is in the u. outbreak or anything like that so i totally counter what you're saying you mentioned that the goal was to save lives slow the rate of infection about half of the deaths however have been in homes for the elderly which you've also highlighted and those over 70 have accounted for almost 90 percent of all deaths 90 percent of all all deaths so when you set out those goals was it just for the young in your population. no we hope that we should be

able to or see to that vulnerable groups did not get the disease but we didn't manage to get it out of our elderly care home and that is something you really have to look into in sweden men the elderly care home is privately owned there is a lot of precarious work there is also a lot of people working there who don't even have a monthly salary there they are only there per hour many of those didn't stay home when they have slight symptom and disses something that we in sweden one reason you are to to evaluate later what was your level of responsibility though because we have the former state epidemiologist on a kalinda saying the following about your your handling of this she says there was no strategy at all for the elderly i now understand that i do not understand how

they can stand and say the level of preparedness was good when in fact it was lousy was there no plan for the elderly well actually shameful isn't it. when it's your worst i think that you are actually acting like this this kind of. world in who get the disease or not get the disease we don't see it that way that's not how responsible government is handling those issues actually what we have in sweden is another way of. governmental organization we have very much a local level care is taken care of regional level the spittal care is taken care of and then we have this central level with a very small ministries and very big authorities and that means that if it's not working on one of the levels then we will have

a problem and that is why the state had to go in and take a lot of decision when we saw what was happening in the locally around and mostly privately run elderly care homes that means for example that we have taken more than 40 different ordinance and also several new laws so that the central level could be able to go in and decide also another levels and now we could see the disease and the transmission of the virus is actually going down india lily care but for example the regional organisation for regional and local authorities stated that there was more than 40 percent of those who were employed that didn't have enough knowledge of basic hygiene care for example how you wash your hands and so on and so forth that is now being taken care of

12140000 having got an education so let's take a deeper look at why this happened in the elderly kell care homes because there have been these horrific reports from news outlets that. not everything has been done to save the lives of the elderly aid workers and care homes as you've also highlighted were reportedly told that they should not send anyone to the hospital for intensive care even if they were in critical condition you've mentioned that you're launching a you know a commission to look into the strategy that you've also launched additional measures but at the end of the day it is too late for the families who have lost loved ones it is too late for those nearly 5000 who have died so what do you say to them. well every death is very tragic and that is of course nothing that we wanted to have the corn coronavirus i don't think you thought that in germany too and i don't think that anyone think that well this is

something that the government wants for anybody and that's also the case for our government we have really really tried to work out the best strategy but we have like several other countries very high virus transmission in a regional part of sweden that is stockholm and the areas around it. it came into the elderly care homes and that is of course very very unfortunate and that's why we have taken central decision to make it better and that's why we are now in a much better position we don't have any exits the death rate any more and it's going down or so when it comes to intensive care and the people on the hospital which are of course hope will stay so that there will be no more sick and way we don't know what happened this was a new virus to everybody i'd like to talk with you about that potential 2nd

wave because we have had your chief epidemiologist saying the following about the potential for that suite in we'll see more cases for a period but in the long term we hope will have better control of the pandemic is also highlighted the fact that in the autumn there will be a 2nd wave sweden will have a high level of immunity and the number of cases will probably the quite low you see you say you're in a better position now but but ultimately i mean you do have nearly 5000 dead in the country there is so little know about immunity and cold it 19 so i'd just like to ask you where we're is your science or just sweden no more then then all of the other leading researchers in the world. well i don't think anybody knows right now about possible of herd immunity or how long an immunity should stay or if there is a 2nd wave or 3rd wave or anything like that that is not possible to say because

it's the 1st time in the history of the world that we have discovered 19. pandemic we have never had it before so we cannot know about that. there has been talk though there has been hope for the 1st vaccine perhaps being on the market by the end of 2020 of trials go well be you already signed a deal with drug maker astra zeneca for 400000000 doses. have you considered that a vaccine could come to the market so quickly and have you considered that you might be front loading or at least with the strategy might have front loaded your human losses without having the science to back up that it's a smart move in the long run. well we have now put. billions we describe on and the vaccine coordinator because of course we hope that the vaccine that comes will be part of a global common good and it will come to do those who do serve it most.

but did you have the right science on immunity. well actually i'm a minister of foreign affairs so i don't know if we have the right of herd immunity or whatever and i hope that you would or so interview the middle east the minister of social affairs to be more able to discuss those issues. i'd like to talk about something that you have spoken quite extensively on the swedish coronavirus policy was designed on a system of trust politicians authorities the public you've spoken very highly about the system of trust but but the latest polls indicate the following about that level of trust about the swedish public has in your policy only 45 percent of swedes have now a fairly high or a very high faith in the strategy compared with 63 percent and if all that that's

a pretty dramatic dip do you see that as as damaging to your relationship with the public and you know the concept of a of a stable and a and as a sane and a reasonable sweden. that is not what we talk about when we talk about trust you have misunderstood it unfortunately because when we talk about trust that is if people are trusting the pope with the political and the authorities in what measures should be taken that is not legally binding and still after 3 months more than 80 percent of the people are full of the recommendation and that is trust and that is because the swedish people know that when recommendations come from authorities that is not some teeth that you are supposed to fall or not you should follow it and they do more than a degree of 80 percent that is the trust that we are talking about and that is very

very good because for a long time actually since the 16th century it has been built on big authority is small ministries it's the advisory recommendation of authorities combined with a legally binding measures that he's always taking form of a strategy or so days time and i'm very very proud that so many swedish people are actually having a trust's of the year following the recommendation lynn of course if they have trust in the political parties or so on that is a completely different issue let's talk a little bit more about the relationship that you have with your neighbors right now the state of trust there your neighbors including finland norway and denmark are lifting travel restrictions in the region but for the most part they are excluding sweden due to its higher level of covert 1000 infections they have concerns they have voice them on record you traditionally have excellent

communication and cooperation with your nordic neighbors so leaving sweden outbreaks with a longstanding close cooperation you're the foreign minister what do you think about being isolated by your neighbors right now. well i'm so glad that we have such an excellent door that corporation like we managed to repatch reate 8600 swedes from all over the world with a very close a good nordic operation we have minister of foreign affairs meeting every week we had consular meetings with our consular diplomats every day and we had a very very close nordic operation managed to get everybody back home we are also of course keeping that cooperation now during the week and i had long talks with both my norwegian and my day in the league and i also have contact with my finnish colleague and for example we are now hoping that everybody will vote for norway to

morrow so they get a c. in the council a security council in united nation but one thing that is not so very good is the border corporation where everybody who has been living working. having families across the borders have been very very aware of that we are different nations in for example the knot of sweden between. than torneo it has been practically like one town and suddenly now when we were at heat differently by the coronavirus border borth closed and that will be wounds that will take time to to heal how about the wounds with your european partners we also have the e.u. home affairs commissioner earlier hansen who also happens to be swedish she wants

e.u. member states to lift all border checks within the block by the end of june as we mentioned to the european c.d.c. their assessment is that your wave of transmission has not yet so that's not happening as it. well we have to see it because that's the decision from every country themself and every country is doing what they think is best we have since the beginning wanted to have a coordinated in e.u. wide solution that would have been the best but that has shown it's not possible but i still i mean you are was in the government together with me so we know each other very well and we speak all the time so i know very well that they really want to have a coordinated answer and i think that would have been the best because now every country has their own. right reason for why they are lifting or not lifting

different border conscience and that is not the best of the time for you and for example different countries they have export restrictions sweden did not have it for example with the space spanish prime minister said when we couldn't get our medical equipment sweden came and helped us to get it free from countries who had put export restrictions or so on medical and let's talk about that take the where yeah let's talk about that because you're getting into the economic aspects aspect of this pandemic now the e.u. facing the worst recession in its history it's exposing wrist between countries about how to deal with that you've highlighted some of them you highlighted on the export front we have southern states like italy spain they've been the hardest hit they have pleaded for aid from the e.u. in the form of grants and neutralize debt of cleavage that you and 3 other nations called the frugal for mostly in the blocks north oppose now the e.u.

of course it's a union that goes far beyond a single market it's a union of values european identities solidarity how should this project survive if you and your frugal for allies who together only represent less than 10 percent of the e.u. population tell the citizens of some of the largest countries whose economies are literally too big to fail that you won't support your partners when they need help the most. well it sounds like you want to troll us out of e.u. i don't think the other countries want that i think that the e.u. really really wants to stay in 27 countries and that is what we are planning to do but of course we could have differences when it comes to how you should have. released or ring of the economic situation from our part with always said that there is a sound good economy as

a basis of everything and that this are also how we are now recently we think that we should have a recovery plan but we think it should be done in a sound and economically wise way and that is why we think it should be just the measures measures that is time limited it should be measures that is controlled. that is what we will work for even. m. if that this the budget discussion put it together we are not against to have a recovery plan not at all but we want to do it in a responsible way so responsible in a sound way and let's drill down a little bit deeper into the message that your group the full 4 has been sending to your european partners in need because after 9 countries including italy and spain as we mentioned requested financial support in the form of neutralize debt the dutch finance minister said the following brussels should study why some

governments lacked the financial wherewithal to fight the crisis on their own and in that context i would like to ask you i mean it is now really the best time to be taking the high ground in a lesson in fiscal more ality a time when your partners need help. well actually i think that we should help each other for example by keeping the internal market totally open so you don't put export restriction to anybody that actually need help from other countries sweden has been one of the country who has been most active when it comes to ventilators all over europe when some other countries wanted to keep them for themselves for their national people we didn't do that we showed that solidarity we also showed a lot of solidarity by giving very very high grants to world health organization the united nation the vaccine program because we think that this is

a global pandemic that we should fight globally so you said that you have expressed a sense of solidarity you know one of the chief messages of those who support this mix of grants and loans is that it does indeed benefit all states in the e.u. for example he says the frugal countries benefit disproportionately from the single market and so should swing behind the proposals and now this is coming from the e.u.'s budget commissioner who is austrian. tell us i mean sweden is an export based economy over 70 percent of swedish exports and if in the e.u. if the single market burns so does your economy so does he have a point here. yeah it is of course the budgetary commissioner warrants the e.u. to have a much bigger budget he was no he would not do his job if he didn't have that view but we are saying the same thing we are always saying we think that the e.u.

should have a sound economy we don't think it should be too much loans and we don't think it should be mutal iced that is actually now it's against the 33 of the e.u. to have mutal i slowed so this next weekend's negotiation amongst leaders will of course be very very interesting and we i don't think that they are supposed to take the decision now but it will be much clearer in what way it would be possible to go to get to recover early plan but not to put jeopardy on the. economy. i'd like to ask you because one of the areas that has come up when we're talking about jeopardy for the use economy is this issue of inequality and unequal recovery merkel in mccrone have warned that allowing some e.u. countries to recover faster and some stronger would only deepen inequalities in the block hampering the way the trade operates internally funder line has also stressed

that it's crucial for the recovery to be even so see even have the fiscally conservative germans recognizing the need for grants in the recovery fund aren't you forcing a more unequal europe with your approach where is the solidarity where is the urgency i am a i think more equal e.u. is nothing that anybody want and not to have an equality inside the country that's why i hope that many more countries would follow our example to have a tax system that is more equalizing the possibility for people to have the same possibilities both when it comes to job to education and to pay more for the for the. colman hoots and that is something i think should be a national thing and there is a lot to discuss there when it comes to quality inside and between countries and i don't think sweden missed the country to blame here what is your vision then of the

e.u. post carona i mean if the e.u. can't rise to the challenge now and use this moment for further integration further solidarity further consensus coming together when it's really facing this massive public health crisis and the greatest economic challenge since it was created then when when when will it become a stronger union well e.u. has been managing so many crises during the whole lifetime movie you am i quite sure that the e.u. will manage it managing this crisis as well and it will take some time to go back through to the economy to the free borderers to the internal market but we will manage as we have star always i am not afraid of that that's nothing i worry about swedish foreign minister and linda thank you for joining us on complex one.

thank you very much.

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