As the situation in Denmark continues to improve, people have the luxury of speculating about what will come next. 

Three of Denmark’s Regions, which manage the public hospitals, report that if the number of Covid-19 patients follow the original forecast from March 13, they wouldn’t have enough nurses in the intensive care units (DK). According to that forecast, the number of cases would peak in the two weeks after Easter. The trend has improved since that forecast, but the Regions have issued a warning that if it rises again, they will lack some 1,300 nurses and will need to train other nurses to work in ICUs. They have begun giving nurses a two-day course in case they are needed. Joachim Hoffmann-Petersen, chairman of the Danish Association for Anesthesiology and Intensive Medicine, says that it is too early to think of opening the country up for normal activities as early as next week, a possibility that Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen announced last week. It takes four weeks for a patient to go through a recovery cycle – one week from infection to showing symptoms, another week before becoming critically ill, and two weeks on a respirator until the patient is no longer infectious. 

With Denmark’s success in flattening the curve of cases, people have begun to debate how the process of reopening (DK) the country is to take place. The main strategy is control the number of infected persons so that the hospital system can treat them. If the ultimate objective is herd immunity, with more than 60 percent of the population infected and recovered and presumably immune, that is a long process. It will require exposing many people to the virus, and an estimated 2 percent will die. The WHO advises against pursuing herd immunity, instead recommending mass testing and isolation of those testing positive. And there is not yet evidence that those who recover will remain immune, says Astrid IIversen, Professor of Virology and Immunology at Oxford University and an advocate of WHO’S recommendation. If they are not immune, there is nothing to gain from seeking herd immunity.

Bad times make leaders popular

Mette Frederiksen’s approval rating has shot up (DK) during the crisis, almost doubling. In the beginning of March it was 39 percent, and a month later, it is at 79 percent. Voters on both sides of the political spectrum approve of the way she has handled the crisis. Her approval rating among voters from the left-wing parties is at 93 percent and from right-wing voters, 66 percent, while 9 percent of the latter think she is doing a bad job. Observers note that the plan to manage the crisis was agreed upon by all the parliamentary parties and that the increase may be temporary. The bounce is a typical polling phenomenon during a crisis, as can be seen even in countries where the leadership has done a terrible job addressing it. 

On Sunday evening Frederiksen gave an interview (DK) on DR, the country’s public broadcasting corporation. She reiterated the tentative plan to consider reopening the country next week but warned that it was necessary to continue following a strict policy of social distancing in order to be able to do so. She also stressed that the process would be very gradual and that the world after the crisis wouldn’t resemble the one before it. People would not be crowding together at concerts, for example, and schools and businesses might operate with staggered schedules so that fewer people were gathered together.

Minister for Health Magnus Heunicke made a post on Facebook (DK) urging people to stick to the program. Sunday was a warm, sunny day, and many people were out. Heunicke noted that some people have begun to slack off on the restrictions but it will not be possible to phase them out unless everyone cooperates.

Treating the virus like heartburn

Hospitals in Aarhus will begin testing a Japanese medication, camostat mesylate (DK), on Covid-19 patients. A study in Germany showed that it may slow the process of infection in cells, but this will be the first time it is used on a large number of patients. The doctors expect to be able to see whether it has favorable results after three months. It had some effect against SARS in 2003, Danish researchers at Aarhus University Hospital found. Its original purpose was to treat heartburn.