Family of Swedish virus expert faced threats
SWEDEN’S chief epidemiologist Anders Tegnell, architect of the country’s unorthodox approach to coronavirus, revealed to The Daily Telegraph that his three children had been targeted in death threats he had received.
Dr Tegnell, whose children are grown up, said he had taken a philosophical approach to threats when he started to receive them soon after the pandemic first struck. However, he said he had to call in the police once his family was mentioned.
He said: “Death threats are what happen when you are a public figure. That’s what happens these days. It’s less to do with what you are doing, and more to do with the fact that you are in the media. It’s really not very worrying.
“The only time it became worrying was when they talked about my family and my children. I got mail telling me they knew where my kids lived, so I thought I had better let the police know. They did take that seriously but everything is OK now.”
Dr Tegnell said there was security at his offices in Stockholm and at press conferences. He was reluctant to go into any more detail about the nature of the threats against him or his family, or to say what action police had taken.
Sweden’s approach to Covid has been to try to keep the economy functioning while encouraging the population to observe social distancing and home working. Sweden’s schools have been open throughout as have bars and restaurants but with reduced capacity.
Sweden’s virus death toll stands at 5,697, with Denmark on 613, Finland on 329 and Norway 255. Its neighbours all adopted tough lockdown measures.
Sweden, though, is hoping its approach will pay off when the second wave hits, and its figures have dropped dramatically over the past week. Dr Tegnell says it is better placed to deal with that than the rest of Scandinavia.
He made the disclosures after Anthony Fauci, the most prominent medical adviser to the White House coronavirus task force, said he had received death threats over his support for public health measures. He has clashed regularly with Donald Trump.
Dr Fauci, 79, told CNN’S The Axe Files podcast that the hate mail and “serious threats against me, against my family are not good …. Really? Is this the United States of America?”