A thread about my feelings as an immigrant to Switzerland, watching the handling of COVID right now:

It feels like watching a slow-motion bus crash from inside the bus.

A few numbers: Switzerland is running at 10k+ new confirmed cases per day, at a test positivity rate of 27%.

For comparison: Germany, a country with 10x the population, is running at 17k cases per day and a test positivity rate of 6%.

It is safe to assume that the true number of cases in Switzerland are at least factor 2 higher than what is reported.

That means the density of COVID cases in the population is likely more than 10x higher in Switzerland now than in neighboring Germany.

It is important to keep in mind that Switzerland is also the country with the 2nd highest per-capita GDP in the world, and the 2nd most ...

... expensive medical system.

Switzerland also has a debt-to-GDP-ratio of about 32%, and Swiss government 30-year bonds currently yield -0.4% per year. There country is in slight deflation.

Yesterday's press conference was full of things that were impossible for me as a ...

foreigner to comprehend. It seems that the highest priority of the Swiss government is to *not declare* a lockdown; e.g. not to take any action that could "impact the economy". This is not the same as "avoiding a lockdown" (which would have required taking action months ago).

The most bizarre part was a long argument about "Switzerland cannot afford anything that impacts the economy". This is blatantly false. The entire food industry sector is 2% of GDP. Shutting that down while paying full wages in a fourlough scheme for the next 6 months would...

amount to 1% of GDP in new debt. Given the above numbers, that is trivially absorbed, particularly because of 100 CHF borrowed today, only 88 CHF have to be paid back in 30 years (negative yield).

The entire discussion was so absurd to an outsider, it has (together with some other events) severely shaken my faith in Swiss institutions. The discussion is not being led on a factual basis; there is factionalism, finger-pointing, fiscal ideology, and a refusal to take any ...

responsibility.

The suspicion that I am getting is that Switzerland has actually decided on the flawed "herd immunity" strategy that the UK and Sweden tried for the 2nd wave, while being unwilling to communicate this.

Anyhow, I don't get to vote here, but I've been living hear for nearly 10 years, and pay taxes here. And I feel that the state here has abandoned it's responsibility for the best interest of their own citizen. If "long covid" affects ~10% of those infected, and costs them ~10%...

of lifetime output, and "herd immunity", we are looking at total lifetime costs vastly exceeding a hard lockdown now.

If we assume that the actual new infection rate is 20k per day at the moment, there will be ~3.6m cases by next spring, assuming the reproduction number is ...

brought down to 1. To repeat: 3.6m out of 8m total.

I will be honest: At this point, I am considering just leaving Switzerland asap. I can't easily, because my wife has responsibilities in her work that she can't just drop (high-school teacher), but I feel that the ...

government inaction endangers her and others for no good reason.

Anyhow. This was a long and angry thread, and I apologize for the emotionality of it. All in all: I am not a fan.