Convincing my Swedish mother to use antiseptic gel

"Everyone's talking about the surgical masks," I tell my mom over the phone. It's February, a few days before the first confirmed cases of Covid-19 will appear in Greece, but there's already a debate going on: who should wear masks? In Sweden, where my mom lives, the first case (a woman returning from a trip to Wuhan) was detected as early as January 31, but it was an isolated case and no one is wearing masks there.

"One of the cleaning ladies at the school had one," Mom answers. "Everyone was whispering that we should say something. It looked so strange." On both ends of the line, and opposite sides of Europe, we shrug. We move on to talk about what baby books I want from Sweden's upcoming book sale. She has tickets to come visit me over Swedish Easter.

It's impossible not to compare my two countries' reactions to the coronavirus. We're talking about countries with...