Swedish writer Moa Berglöf has received pushback after insinuating that British Prime Minister Boris Johnson purposely caught the Wuhan coronavirus to distract the public.
Berglöf, who served as a speechwriter for former Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, said that the British leader was playing a “high-stakes game” by becoming infected with the Chinese virus and ending up in intensive care.
The writer made the Twitter post in response to a video released by Prime Minister Johnson following his release from hospital over the weekend.
The author, who writes for newspaper Sydsvenskan, insinuated Johnson had caught the disease “just so he can put out nice movies that make [others] forget all the other crap he’s been doing”.
Expert Predicts Coronavirus 'Tragedy' in Sweden as Deaths Increase https://t.co/Lx7rl1NLxw
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) April 11, 2020
The tweet was bombarded with nearly 500 — mostly critical — replies, including one from Swedish terrorism expert Magnus Ranstorp who said it was an “extremely stupid comment”.
Berglöf, who claims to be a “female supremacist” on Twitter, was the author of one of former Prime Minister Reinfeldt’s most controversial pro-mass migration speeches delivered in 2014 that asked Swedes to “open their hearts” to asylum seekers.
Some in the Moderate Party, which Reinfeldt had led, blamed the speech for sparking a wave of support for the anti-mass migration Sweden Democrats (SD).
Sweden continues to see a surge in coronavirus cases, reporting over 900 deaths on Monday. But according to Annika Dejmek, professor emerita in pathology at Lund university, the numbers may be far higher than officially recorded.
In an opinion article for newspaper Aftonbladet, Professor Dejmek said that seniors who die in their homes, rather than a nursing home or hospital, are not likely to be tested or counted as having died of coronavirus.
“To put it plainly: No one who dies of COVID-19 at home will be included in the death statistics, as their COVID-19 disease had never been confirmed,” she said.
Sweden Approves Animal Anaesthetic for Coronavirus Cases as Supplies Run Low https://t.co/vswXBs7xWm
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) April 13, 2020
Cases in nursing homes have also drastically risen in recent weeks, with homes in 18 of Sweden’s 21 counties reporting confirmed cases last week.
The Swedish Medicines Agency has also approved the use of animal anaesthetic drugs on humans to treat severe coronavirus patients as drug supplies run low.
Björn Olsen, Professor of Infectious Medicine at the University of Uppsala, also warned last week that Sweden might be headed toward “tragedy”, criticising the government’s response to the outbreak.
“I would not estimate how many I fear could die. It can be 5,000 or 10,000. What is happening now is that Sweden is heading towards a tragedy,” Olsen said.
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