Sweden did quite well economically too https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/which-econom... although Denmark beat them in both economy and deaths. I guess if you've got a country of mostly responsible educated people you can say behave sensibly without the government legislating loads of rules.
Germany gave itself a pat on the back the whole pandemic, and demonized Sweden, but looking the numbers, we have a totally different story. One of the main factors, said here is that Germany has a higher population density than Sweden, and the population trust more their government decisions[1]
