Denmark During a Pandemic
As it is 2021, I must comment on how Denmark is handling the pandemic and what the world looks like this summer. When looking at the past year, it can be said that the Danes had navigated the pandemic better than some of the other leading figures in our world. At the beginning of the pandemic, they implemented an intense lockdown way before many of its Scandinavian neighbors or before other countries in the world even considered it. Because of this, it slowed the spread of covid and they gradually opened back up again with many precautions.
Fast forward to now.
I arrived in Denmark in mid-June and a week before I left, they opened up the country for students to travel there. Beforehand, there were restrictions on who can enter the country. If you are not a student and are traveling to the country for fun, you are required to have a vaccination card or corona pass along with a negative covid test.
Once I arrived in Denmark it became a whole new world I was not used to. In America, I was accustomed to people wearing masks with lifted restrictions or not. Here it is very uncommon to wear one outside of the metro or train (as this is the only place a mask is mandatory). Interestingly enough though, covid rates are not very high. People here are required to have a negative covid test and proof through a corona pass in order to get into many facilities. In comparison, in the United States, you do not have to prove that you are vaccinated or have a negative test to get away without a mask.
When I got here it was very unusual to walk around without a mask yet I have not felt unsafe once since being here. Although I am vaccinated, Denmark seems to have moved past the existential dread of covid. There are many signs left from when there were strict covid restrictions in place but overall, people do not seem to be bothered by it.
There are rules to wear your mask on the metro and restaurants are not allowed to have people standing. I also noticed that restaurants and stores still have plexiglass between booths and the cashiers. After living in America during the pandemic, my time in Denmark feels like they are in a different time and different reality; one where the pandemic didn’t completely flip things on its head. Interestingly enough, both my study program and Denmark have covid precautions in place but it feels as if life is back to normal.
The most intimidating part of the whole process of living in Denmark during a pandemic would be the flight over. Being stuck on a plane for hours on end is less than ideal with an airborne virus going around but I came out of it alright. The flights were fairly packed but people were required to wear masks and to have a negative covid test before flying (this is up to the discretion of the countries policies and the airlines’ policies).
I am not a professional epidemiologist but as a regular person who goes about their day-to-day life in a pandemic, I feel pretty comfortable here in Copenhagen.
