Lockdown in Europe

Snapshots of the lockdown stringency in Europe (0 = no lockdown, 100 = strict lockdown). Sweden grabbed a lot of headlines by remaining mostly open, but Belarus is the real outlier (for many reasons).

Governments throughout Europe (and much of the world) enforced compulsory lockdown measures on citizens in an effort to curb the spread of COVID-19. These heat maps show snapshots of the severity of national lockdowns at intervals from January to July. Using an index from the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford, lockdown stringency is graded between 0 and 100.

In January, as the virus was only just beginning to spread in Europe, lockdown measures were weak, if at all present. By March and May, when the pandemic was reaching its peak in most parts of Europe, strict lockdowns were in force across much of the continent. By July, the heat map is reasonably homogeneous, reflecting that European countries had largely arrived at moderate lockdown measures. 

Sweden and Belarus are conspicuous, particularly in March, for having noticeably less stringent lockdowns than the rest of Europe. The contrarian strategy of Sweden, which placed trust in its citizens to voluntarily take sensible precautions to curb the spread of the virus, was widely reported in the media. Many observers are paying close attention to see if this strategy is ultimately deemed a success or failure. The situation in Belarus is more complicated, owing to recent political unrest in the country.